Apple cancels its autonomous electric car project and is laying off some workers | TechCrunch
Apple cancels its autonomous electric car project and is laying off some workers | TechCrunch
The decision brings an end to a decade-long attempt to enter the automotive space, which involved numerous pivots and thousands of workers.
Not surprised. Building cars is a high overhead, low margin business. Not to mention being difficult… like very difficult. Furthermore, if the rumors are to be believed, the initial version of this car would have been priced around 100k US, which is totally unaffordable for your average consumer. Apple is better off sticking to something that they know, like building software for other peoples’ cars
I think if Steve was still CEO. Apple might have been able to push out a "disruptor". But unfortunately Tim Cook took the reins and the program was essentially dead on arrival. The short EV hype brought it back from the dead but ultimately suffered the same fate.
Tim Cook is better than most CEOs but he's definitely not a Steve Jobs-type.
I think Steve would have canned it earlier. The money is better spent in AI and with that training, then maybe autonomous driving might make sense.
Apple would be better off partnering with Tesla and doing the software side. Tesla hardware is nice but their software lacks polish.
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