Apple hires Ford veteran for 'Apple Car' project

Comments

• Reply 1 of 13

  y2an Posts: 187member

  May 3, 2022 4:56PM

  Sigh. Stop mischaracterising. Hiring someone legally is not poaching. 

  
• Reply 2 of 13

  cg27 Posts: 213member

  May 3, 2022 5:44PM

  Seems there’s been quite a bit of cross pollination between Ford and Apple at the EV leadership level over the years.
• Reply 3 of 13

  KTR Posts: 279member

  May 3, 2022 6:12PM

  Will apple EVER get his self driving car off the ground?  they Need to look at all Tesla mistakes and NOT do the samething
  
  

  
• Reply 4 of 13

  hodar Posts: 357member

  May 3, 2022 9:32PM

  Pretty brave move, leaving Ford with 30 years experience.
  
  Apple Fires 200 Employees From Its Electric Car Project (news18.com)
  

  
• Reply 5 of 13

  thrang Posts: 1,008member

  May 4, 2022 4:26AM

  hodar said:

  Pretty brave move, leaving Ford with 30 years experience.
  
  Apple Fires 200 Employees From Its Electric Car Project (news18.com)
  

  The article is from 2019, speculative, so so what?

  
• Reply 6 of 13

  welshdog Posts: 1,897member

  May 5, 2022 4:00AM

  •Marc newson designed the O21C car for Ford as a design exercise in 1999.

  •Newson and Ive, via Love From, have a deal to design cars for Ferrari as of September 2021
  

  •Ive and Newson are known as "car guys" - From the New Yorker: "He and Newson are car guys, and they feel disappointed with most modern cars"

  •Eddy Cue joined Ferrari's Board of Directors in November 2012.

  •Love From is alleged to continue doing design work for Apple on an unknown basis/project.

  •Apple hires a high level Ford safety exec indicating they are still serious about building a car.

  •Apple hired Ulrich Kranz, a former senior executive at BMW AG’s electric car division in 2021.

  •Apple hired etc.etc.etc.

  
  

  Seems to me the car project is still very much on and moving forward. And as far as looking at what Tesla did wrong, why bother if you are hiring exerienced designers, executives, engineers and experts from within the industry? The mistake Tesla made was not hiring anyone from the car industry until their production line was in chaos. Like Apple would ever do anything like that.
  

  
  
  
  
  

  
• Reply 7 of 13

  tht Posts: 5,437member

  May 5, 2022 4:24AM

  I'm afraid their window for market entry is closing. It still sounds like they are 3 to 4 years away and that will be too late in 2025 imo. As a EV maker, one with ambitions to dent the market starting 2025, they would need to:
  

  1. Develop a supply chain for solid state batteries, with enough mass production for a 300 mile range $50k base model. From component supply to assembled structural battery package.
  2. Build out a supercharging station network along major highways every 100 miles.
  3. Develop service stations and service ecosystem
  4. Ensure carbon neutral processes and energy supply from components, materials, and recycling

  Don't get this waiting at all, especially for computer driving. They need to get something on the market and iterate, and needed to do it in 2020 let alone now. The don't need to have self driving. There are many hard things to get built up to even have something on the market.
  
  

  
• Reply 8 of 13

  darkvader Posts: 1,146member

  May 5, 2022 2:16PM

  She'll be gone within two years.  Whether that's because she's fired, leaves to work at a car company that stands a chance of actually building a car, or just decides it's time to retire and count her money is the only question.
  
• Reply 9 of 13

  13485 Posts: 347member

  May 5, 2022 6:04PM

  tht said:

  I'm afraid their window for market entry is closing. It still sounds like they are 3 to 4 years away and that will be too late in 2025 imo. As a EV maker, one with ambitions to dent the market starting 2025, they would need to:
  

  1. Develop a supply chain for solid state batteries, with enough mass production for a 300 mile range $50k base model. From component supply to assembled structural battery package.
  2. Build out a supercharging station network along major highways every 100 miles.
  3. Develop service stations and service ecosystem
  4. Ensure carbon neutral processes and energy supply from components, materials, and recycling

  Don't get this waiting at all, especially for computer driving. They need to get something on the market and iterate, and needed to do it in 2020 let alone now. The don't need to have self driving. There are many hard things to get built up to even have something on the market.
  
  

  Why on earth would Apple's "window for market entry" be closing? It's just competition, not a race. Will people simply stop buying cars after buying an existing model now? After all, Apple was 100 years "too late" with their first phone, and decades late with their first computer, yet still managed to sell a few units.
  
  1. Batteries will be available, there is no "sole source". 
  2. Super charging stations will be vehicle generic, either due to market forces, or by government edict. Are gas stations specific to only a select vehicle? If a corporation was funding charging stations, you can bet they will want to charge every EV on the road.
  3. Service stations are not a barrier, most issues will be electronically diagnosed and most components will be modular and easily replaced.
  4. Apple has always been ahead of the curve on carbon neutral energy supply compared to other corporations. 

  
• Reply 10 of 13

  programmer Posts: 3,458member

  May 5, 2022 6:44PM

  13485 said:

  tht said:

  I'm afraid their window for market entry is closing. It still sounds like they are 3 to 4 years away and that will be too late in 2025 imo. As a EV maker, one with ambitions to dent the market starting 2025, they would need to:
  

  1. Develop a supply chain for solid state batteries, with enough mass production for a 300 mile range $50k base model. From component supply to assembled structural battery package.
  2. Build out a supercharging station network along major highways every 100 miles.
  3. Develop service stations and service ecosystem
  4. Ensure carbon neutral processes and energy supply from components, materials, and recycling

  Don't get this waiting at all, especially for computer driving. They need to get something on the market and iterate, and needed to do it in 2020 let alone now. The don't need to have self driving. There are many hard things to get built up to even have something on the market.
  
  

  Why on earth would Apple's "window for market entry" be closing? It's just competition, not a race. Will people simply stop buying cars after buying an existing model now? After all, Apple was 100 years "too late" with their first phone, and decades late with their first computer, yet still managed to sell a few units.
  
  1. Batteries will be available, there is no "sole source". 
  2. Super charging stations will be vehicle generic, either due to market forces, or by government edict. Are gas stations specific to only a select vehicle? If a corporation was funding charging stations, you can bet they will want to charge every EV on the road.
  3. Service stations are not a barrier, most issues will be electronically diagnosed and most components will be modular and easily replaced.
  4. Apple has always been ahead of the curve on carbon neutral energy supply compared to other corporations. 

  What he said ^^^... plus Apple is probably still trying to figure out what product to build.  Jumping into the existing market with a me-too product is not Apple's approach.  They need to have a differentiator, and it takes a long time to figure out what that is and how to build it.

  
• Reply 11 of 13

  darkvader Posts: 1,146member

  May 20, 2022 8:36PM

  13485 said:

  tht said:

  I'm afraid their window for market entry is closing. It still sounds like they are 3 to 4 years away and that will be too late in 2025 imo. As a EV maker, one with ambitions to dent the market starting 2025, they would need to:
  

  1. Develop a supply chain for solid state batteries, with enough mass production for a 300 mile range $50k base model. From component supply to assembled structural battery package.
  2. Build out a supercharging station network along major highways every 100 miles.
  3. Develop service stations and service ecosystem
  4. Ensure carbon neutral processes and energy supply from components, materials, and recycling

  Don't get this waiting at all, especially for computer driving. They need to get something on the market and iterate, and needed to do it in 2020 let alone now. The don't need to have self driving. There are many hard things to get built up to even have something on the market.
  
  

  Why on earth would Apple's "window for market entry" be closing? It's just competition, not a race. Will people simply stop buying cars after buying an existing model now? After all, Apple was 100 years "too late" with their first phone, and decades late with their first computer, yet still managed to sell a few units.
  
  1. Batteries will be available, there is no "sole source". 
  2. Super charging stations will be vehicle generic, either due to market forces, or by government edict. Are gas stations specific to only a select vehicle? If a corporation was funding charging stations, you can bet they will want to charge every EV on the road.
  3. Service stations are not a barrier, most issues will be electronically diagnosed and most components will be modular and easily replaced.
  4. Apple has always been ahead of the curve on carbon neutral energy supply compared to other corporations. 

  
  

  There are time 'windows' for getting into certain markets.  Apple came out with a phone when the smartphone was really just getting started, creating a new smartphone OS and hardware system today would be nearly impossible for any company.  Apple came out with the Apple ][ at exactly the most opportune time, a few years earlier the technology was too expensive, a few years later the market was locked up by Apple and MS.

  The window for creating a new car company is probably already closed.  Tesla jumped in it, Apple... didn't.
  
• Reply 12 of 13

  welshdog Posts: 1,897member

  September 19, 2022 5:15PM

  darkvader said:

  
  

  The window for creating a new car company is probably already closed.  Tesla jumped in it, Apple... didn't.
  

  BS
  
  
• Reply 13 of 13

  mattinoz Posts: 2,315member

  September 20, 2022 1:39AM

  programmer said:

  13485 said:

  tht said:

  I'm afraid their window for market entry is closing. It still sounds like they are 3 to 4 years away and that will be too late in 2025 imo. As a EV maker, one with ambitions to dent the market starting 2025, they would need to:
  

  1. Develop a supply chain for solid state batteries, with enough mass production for a 300 mile range $50k base model. From component supply to assembled structural battery package.
  2. Build out a supercharging station network along major highways every 100 miles.
  3. Develop service stations and service ecosystem
  4. Ensure carbon neutral processes and energy supply from components, materials, and recycling

  Don't get this waiting at all, especially for computer driving. They need to get something on the market and iterate, and needed to do it in 2020 let alone now. The don't need to have self driving. There are many hard things to get built up to even have something on the market.
  
  

  Why on earth would Apple's "window for market entry" be closing? It's just competition, not a race. Will people simply stop buying cars after buying an existing model now? After all, Apple was 100 years "too late" with their first phone, and decades late with their first computer, yet still managed to sell a few units.
  
  1. Batteries will be available, there is no "sole source". 
  2. Super charging stations will be vehicle generic, either due to market forces, or by government edict. Are gas stations specific to only a select vehicle? If a corporation was funding charging stations, you can bet they will want to charge every EV on the road.
  3. Service stations are not a barrier, most issues will be electronically diagnosed and most components will be modular and easily replaced.
  4. Apple has always been ahead of the curve on carbon neutral energy supply compared to other corporations. 

  What he said ^^^... plus Apple is probably still trying to figure out what product to build.  Jumping into the existing market with a me-too product is not Apple's approach.  They need to have a differentiator, and it takes a long time to figure out what that is and how to build it.

  There is still another pivot in the market to come with design as self-driving cars (ie. mobile-dens) It is another point Apple could jump in to the space and offer a product other car companies are reluctant too. 
  
  The whole format and market changes when cars have no drivers. It is something they can built for their own campus, expand to car-as-service or carshare in cities where they have lots of staff to underwrite it, then "reluctantly" offer them to public and finally win the lounge room.