Apple hasn't officially announced this project yet. At this point Apple won't sell you a car. They won't even take your deposit. You, as a car buyer, are irrelevant to them, at this point.
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Apple Seeking 'Large Expanses of Real Estate' for Autonomous Car Project
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Thanks for restating my post, but not sure why except to put an exclamation point by it. Anyway I'll take it as a thumbs up.
So you're saying that autonomous cars will turn human drivers into terrible, obnoxious people.That is a great concern I have - the competition, with world class EXPERIENCE in handling dynamics, auto supply chain partners, ergonomics, etc., are well underway. My belief is that they can buy / design the electric & self driving elements easier / quicker than Apple can buy / design everything. I don't see a compelling advantage that would drive me to an Apple car.
On a side note, I wonder about how easily these autonomous cars will be "manipulated" by other drivers on the road given the wide margin of safety coding that will be incorporated into them for liability reasons. As an example, over the years I have allowed a decent following distance to the car ahead of me. More and more all the in a hurry drivers keep diving into that safety zone and I keep falling further back. Now i speed up a bit to stop those idiots from diving in front of me.
Of course my view is that anyone driving slower than me is an old fuddy duddy that needs to be off the road and anyone driving faster than me is a maniac
I would guess that "reality" is several "lifetimes off" - but needed!
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No, not at all, it won't take an autonomous car to do that - it is already well underway
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Just to expand on that, this video shows a 'phantom' traffic jam happening.
Proves that humans can't keep a steady pace, autonomous cars will be much better at this than us!
I'm cynical enough to be skeptical (though interested) in what Apple's plans are. I'm apparently not cynical enough to construct detailed, specific guesses about those plans and the entire future of Apple, and then to believe those scenarios are the actual future.1) Building cars is not the same set of processes as building hand held gadgets
2) Apple doesn't sweat the details for its manufacturing operations -- they are mostly outsourced
3) Tim Cook is CEO, if he wastes his time dealing with supply chain minutia, then Apple truly is FUBAR
IMO Tesla will join the ranks of the thousands of failed auto companies because Elon Musk is no Henry Ford, and happy talk sprinkled with "vision" cannot conjure half a million vehicles rolling off a production line every year, or the complex network of related operations that are needed to support customers.
I'm cynical enough to believe that the uber-secretcar project is little more than a PR ploy (replacing the TV?) intended to keep the investment community from looking elsewhere as Apple reaches the limits of growth on its aging product lines. Tim Cook and his pals made a deal with the AAPL board, and come hell or high water they need to keep the share price elevated so they can cash out and ride off into the sunset. Share buybacks and leaked info of "secret projects" are all part of the scheme as the clock ticks down.
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I have a reservation for a Tesla Model 3.
Would I buy an Apple-branded car? I'm not ready to issue an ultimatum either way, without knowing the features, capabilities, price, and intended market for this hypothetical car.
I don't get EV's like the Tesla, expensive and pretty, but no range. OK for pootling around a city like LA or SF, but simply no damned good for making the 400mile trip from LA to SF. Right now the very best place for an EV is in the city and for that you don't need a big sedan (our streets are already overcrowded) plus I believe this scenario will exist until batteries become truly long distance.
Check out the Arcimoto trike, space for two or one plus luggage, great city range, easy to handle, fun to ride and starts around $12k. If only we could get them in the UK for that price.
So I'd prefer Apple to bring out something like the Arcimoto, something that had Apple's special sauce, but didn't necessarily cost the earth.
Check out the Arcimoto trike, space for two or one plus luggage, great city range, easy to handle, fun to ride and starts around $12k. If only we could get them in the UK for that price.
So I'd prefer Apple to bring out something like the Arcimoto, something that had Apple's special sauce, but didn't necessarily cost the earth.
Apple is building a giant loop underground away from prying eyes... a place perfect for testing emissions free vehicles without having to camo the entire vehicle in plastic and vinyl patterns. A place they can charge, auto park and drive within a contained area in secret. Yet everyone assumes some form of test track is getting built elsewhere...
I would bet these new facilities are for design labs, prototyping machines and manufacturing of those concept vehicles as well as prepping for future expansion of headcount as manufacturing, marketing and selling a vehicle will add dramatic head count.
I would bet these new facilities are for design labs, prototyping machines and manufacturing of those concept vehicles as well as prepping for future expansion of headcount as manufacturing, marketing and selling a vehicle will add dramatic head count.
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Apple is looking to purchase "large expanses of real estate" in the San Francisco Bay Area for its much-rumored car project, codenamed Project Titan, according to The Wall Street Journal. Google parent company Alphabet and several car manufacturers, such as Tesla and Mercedes Benz, are also on the hunt for more space, according to Hudson Pacific, one of the Bay Area's largest landlords.
While the size Coleman references is fairly big, car production plants tend to be even larger. Tesla's Fremont, California factory is 5.3 million square feet while Ford's Flat Rock, Michigan plant, one of its smaller factories, is 2.9 million square feet. For comparison, Apple's new headquarters is 2.8 million square feet while Google's Mountain View campus is 4.8 million square feet.
Map of Apple's newly-purchased real estate in San Jose
In recent months Apple has been leasing more space repeatedly for its car project in the Bay Area. In March, Apple leased a former Pepsi bottling plant in Sunnyvale, California. The Cupertino company has also leased and purchased several smaller, secret buildings likely being used to develop Apple Car technologies. In January, Apple gained approval from the San Jose city council to develop a 4.15 million-square-foot campus in the city.
The WSJ also notes that Apple is in the process of growing its Apple Car team, which had 600 employees last year. Earlier today, it was reported that Apple had hired a former Google employee with experience in electric vehicle charging.
Article Link: Apple Seeking 'Large Expanses of Real Estate' for Autonomous Car Project
Wow! They are serious about this.
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Maybe. Maybe it is the next literal big thing.
To be fair, Apple isn't selling anything in this space, yet. No announced product = no vaporware.
Fair enough -- really just poor wording on my part. You are right, an unannounced product can't be vapor by definition. But the point of my post was that other car makers are not competing w/ Apple right now because Apple isn't a player in the field yet. When I wrote vapor I meant the car doesn't exist, but it does have a larger meaning than that so it was inaccurate.
I've heard conflicting reports. I've heard some people saying BMW is releasing a 120 mile EV in the next few months. I"ve heard others say it'll be 180 miles. Not sure if they're separate cars getting released in the same timeframe, or one is this year's model and the other is next year's, or if the 180 mile people are just mistaken altogether (perhaps mistook km for miles?)
I haven't investigated because I'm not at all interested. I have a tiny amount of interest in GM and the Apple Car, but I've already put down my $1K deposit on the Model 3, and I'm excited to get it next year. I find it very unlikely that anyone is going to be releasing a car in the same league before 2020.
With the salaries these people get, and the exhorbanent cost of living in SF, I think it would be pretty great to live and work elsewhere with that pay. And I'm not talking about in the middle of nowhere either.
Given the volatile nature of this business Apple may be entering, it's quite possible. Maybe not sink Apple, but there could be some bad days/years ahead for them.
If Apple do release an Apple car then they won't make it themselves, instead they will get a company like Magna to make them, or partner with an existing supplier to make on their production lines.
What a ignorant statement. Look at the video about a his Tesla from Calgary CA to Anaheim in California!
If you want my long answer on the subject, here's my blog post:Next year? You are quite the optimist, aren't you?
http://excitementexplained.tumblr.com/post/144006407822/when-will-the-tesla-model-3-actually-ship
My short answer is: I think Tesla will ship the first Model 3 in July 2017. I expect that, as someone who put down my deposit in the US at 10:40 AM on the day of, I'll get mine less than a year after that. So hopefully next year. But maybe not until early 2018.
Musk has announced that Tesla's goal is to ship 100-200K Model 3s in 2017. If they manage even half of the low end of that range, I'll get my car in 2017. But I don't make much faith in them being able to ramp up that fast.
Buying land in the San Francisco Bay Area can't be a money pit. It'll be worth twice as much before long. Gravity has been rescinded in that market.
Somebody should go out to the middle of nowhere and build a Potemkin village complete with an urban core, suburbs, dirt roads, highways, alleys and streets, and populate it with animatronic (or just cardboard) pedestrians. Add sprinklers and snow-blowers to the buildings so they could simulate any condition. All the automakers would probably pay millions to lease time in that fake city. In between road tests, it could be leased to movie studios, or used by the government for urban warfare drills, etc.
And all similar posts.
BMW has a 5.5 million sq ft plant in Greer SC where they build X3's, X4's, X5's, and X6' for the global market. They are not having any problems obtaining workers to produce 400,000 plus cars annually.
Granted these BMW's are not self driving cars, but if Apple is just looking for space for an assembly plant, the parts can be designed /built anywhere. Which probably would be the case with a California site.
There are a bunch of event type things being set up in Sunnyvale - I wonder if its related? Very top secret and no one knows what its for - rumor is it is for "Project Titan"