Apple Car: Everything we know so far

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Apple, the most secretive technology company in the world… until Apple Car. We first heard some whispers about the development of an Apple Car back in 2015. Even going back to 2008, Steve Jobs actually considered making an Apple-branded vehicle until he eventually ‘decided against it,’ apparently due to the automotive industry collapsing during the U.S. financial crisis. This information was brought to light by Tony Fadell, the inventor of the iPod and co-inventor of the iPhone.

Heading to today, the industry looks vastly different — with every major car manufacturer looking to bring some kind of electric and/or autonomous vehicle to market. Apple has had no choice other than to make this project more public than others — due to necessary regulatory approvals that give the company no choice. Tim Cook himself has even admitted to working on “self-driving technology,” reports QZ.com

From Tim Cook:

Clearly one purpose of autonomous systems is self-driving cars—there are others and we sort of see it as the mother of all AI projects—it’s probably one of the most difficult AI projects to work on. — Tim Cook

Whilst Apple’s CEO isn’t exclusively admitting to creating an Apple Car, he did admit to working on self-driving technology.

What features can we expect from the Apple Car?

We can expect to see self-driving technology, of course. Unlike Tesla, Apple does not want to slowly roll this out with beta’s and tests, they want to have level five 100% autonomous driving from day one — very Apple. We can also expect LiDAR to be the super-human eyes of the Apple Car.

However, Tesla’s CEO Elon Musk commented saying:

Anyone relying on LiDAR is doomed. — Elon Musk, reported by CNN.

Some rumors have even suggested that whatever sensors Apple ends up using will be ‘so reliable’ that the Apple Car may not even have a steering wheel — and would instead be activated using Apple’s voice assistant, Siri. However, Apple will still have a lot of important negotiations to get through in order to get the go ahead (mainly due to regulations). Another feature we can look forward to seeing is a huge sunroof that can be converted into any number of positions according to the drivers preference. Patents have also been found for seats with haptic feedback, presumably for warnings such as lane drifting (without any need of loud noises or visual cues on the dashboard). This is likely to help to keep the journey silent and relaxing for other passengers in the vehicle.

How about headlights that have auto-brightness just like your iPhone? That’s right. The headlights may change brightness based on how dark or light the street you’re driving on is. Or seat belts that tighten in an unavoidable collision. This information comes from several patents published by the company, as spotted by Patently Apple. When it comes to the interior lighting, we are expecting to see Apple utilise their true-tone technology. This will mean, based on the outside lighting, that the car will automatically adjust the interior to match.

The possibility of retractable bumpers are also being talked about. The advantage of having this is that they will expand in an accident, keeping the passengers as safe as possible, but also detract when fitting into tight parking spaces, reports Apple Explained.

All Apple products work together right? And the Apple Car is no exception. Motion sickness could be a thing of the past, or at least greatly reduced. This will work by measuring the discrepancy between the cars movement and the iPhone users movement.

But when can we expect this to be revealed? Basing this on rumors so far, the earliest we could see the Apple Car will be in 2024, with the latest being 2027.

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Published to Apple Scoop on 27th February, 2021.