Chinese Automakers Shocked at Apple's Decision to Cancel Car Project

[wonderings]

The Chinese will turn the EV market, where they are able to sell, into a price war. EV growth is limited going forward because most drivers don’t have chargers at home and find it a hassle to charge outside the home.

I think most people factor into the cost of a new EV that they will have home charging installed. The big cities this is obviously an issue, but for people leaving in detached houses I think you just work that into the price when buying. I know if I were to buy an EV it would have home charging.

 

[The-Real-Deal82]

Why shocked? So they can't steal the design & ip like they steal every other bit of IP from Apple?

It’s the opposite in the EV car industry, China are the ones making the market stop and listen, and they are offering more for less. It’s quite worrying for European marques.

 

[The-Real-Deal82]

The problem with EVs in general are the batteries, the charge time and the charging infrastructure. We need much better battery tech where cars can go 500+ miles on an 80% charge, charge from almost empty to 80% in 10 mins and WAYYYYYYY more charging infrastructure. For now, EVs are good for large cities, that's really about it IMO.

That is not entirely correct. EV’s are good for people who drive less than 250 miles a day, so plenty good enough for most drivers. People who drive for a living and cover hundreds of miles a week would see the negatives but not the average driver. Charging times on fast chargers is fairly quick 25 to 40 minutes and suitable if stopping for a toilet break on longer journeys. My wife and I cope with an EV as our main family car and don’t live in a small city, let alone a large one. We’ve done 200 mile journeys without charging a few times now and sure if forces you to plan a bit better, but it’s not the headache those with no EV experience would like you to believe.

The charging infrastructure can certainly improve, but it is almost by the day.

 

[CasinoOwl]

Xiaomi is probably just scared that they don't have Apple to copy. Good luck!

 

[JoshuaBru]

Why is everyone so shocked. The EV market is bloated and collapsing. Apple is smart enough to see the writing on the walls. They’ll stick to selling an iPhone every 2 years to every single person in each household. Not 1 EV every 8 years in 1 out of every 25-30 households.

 

[darngooddesign]

0 for 2

Huawei = Designed and fabbed own 5G modem + EV
Apple = No modem or EV

I'd be shocked too.

Huawei did not fab its own EV, they developed it with Cherry by using Cherry's EV platform. Regarding the modem, while H did design it, SMIC manufactured it in the same way that TSMC manufactures the M chips that Apple designed.

 

[HMI]

The Surprised Pikachu meme will now be replaced by the Shocked Chinese Automakers meme.


Maybe @vegetassj4 will whip up a picture.

What happened to @AngerDanger? I haven’t seen his brilliant graphics in a while.

 

[Miles Teg]

Here is a good analysis why Apple chose to drop the Apple Car.

Spoiler: profit margins were too low.

 

[Alameda]

The base line cost to upgrade to a 200 Amp Panel, required for an EV home charging station, includes a line pull from the pole to the home upgrade and that'll set you back, on average, between $10k-$15k on top of the price of the EV.

Most EVs are already cost prohibitive. The panel upgrade is a DOA for most American homes until the Govt steps in and helps regulate that cost.

According to Angie's List, the cost to upgrade to a 200A panel is $1,200 to $2,000, but of course it could cost more if your home situated far from a pole or other unusual circumstances exist.

People get 200A panel upgrades all the time, not only for electric cars, but when they remodel their kitchen, install central air, and often it's required for any general home remodel. Point is, a car charger isn't a special kind of electrical device. Electric clothing dryers, central AC, electric water heaters, electric ovens and heaters are some of many home devices which consume the same amount of power as an electric car charger.

What's different with EV chargers is that with those other devices, the oil industry didn't feel threatened, so they didn't sew seeds of fear, uncertainty and doubt through a sophisticated misinformation campaign. America's electricity generation has grown an average of 15% per year ever since electricity was first deployed in the United States.

 

[Surf Monkey]

True. I’ve seen dozens of articles stating the opposite, keep cherry picking

https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/industry-pain-abounds-electric-car-demand-hits-slowdown-2024-01-30/

This doesn’t contradict the one I posted and please don’t accuse me of doing something I didn’t do.

 

[nt5672]

"all electricity comes from some form of gas or coal" is not true. Plenty houses and server farms use solar panels, and 18% electricity comes from nuclear source in US, and 20% in EU.

Good point, but what happens to nuclear waste? Aah wait, it sets in an underground bunker for 40 or 50,000 years contaminating the ground water. That's a good option? How much waste are we going to generate in 50,000 years. Nope that is worse than gas.

Let's go with solar panels, which produce nothing at night or during storms. Have panels that must be replaced every 15+ years, which fills landfills. I known all of the do-gooders say they last 50 years, but if you have ever owed a solar panel, you know that is a crock. Solor panels start dying the first day of use. Recycling costs 10 times more than the recovered materials. So we still need gas to backup solar panels. Ohh, and the batteries to store solar energy must be replace every 6 years. More child exploitation and environmental damage.

Of course, you forget wind. Yep the blades crap out about every 6 to 15 years, again filling landfills with hazardous material. You also need batteries to store the energy for when it is NOT windy. More child exploitation and environmental damage.

With gas, a natural byproduct Co2 is produced that harms no one. In fact humans breath out Co2 every day, with every breath. And gas is renewable. Every year we find new deposits. New deposits are a natural function of compressing organic matter deep within the earth's crust. In some places natural petroleum oozes right out of the ground. Can't get anymore natural than that.

 

[gtg465x]

Plus the fact that all electricity comes from some form of gas or coal, making electricity more expensive coupled with the fact that the batteries have to be replaced every 6 years at a cost of $10,000 to $20,000. EVs make no sense if you study the facts.

Not all electricity comes from gas or coal. 60% comes from natural gas and coal, 21% comes from renewables, and the amount coming from renewables keeps climbing. Anyways, EVs are still cleaner even when the electricity comes from coal.

You also don't have to replace EV batteries every 6 years, unless you get one that's defective from the start or you're driving 40-50k miles per year. These aren't your grandpa's lead acid car batteries that need to be replaced every 5 years. There are a bunch of EVs out there with original batteries that are more than 10 years old at this point. Also, most EVs have 8-10 year battery warranties, and there's no way manufacturers would be offering warranties that long if the batteries were expected to die in 6 years. Tesla expects their batteries to last 200,000-500,000 miles, or even more for their models with LFP batteries. While they might not last as long as the best Toyota engines, they should have a similar lifespan to the average internal combustion engine. https://www.motortrend.com/features/how-long-does-a-tesla-battery-last/

 

[nt5672]

Not all electricity comes from gas or coal. 60% comes from natural gas and coal, and 21% comes from renewables, and that number keeps climbing. Anyways, EVs are still cleaner even when the electricity comes from coal.
. . . . .

What a crock, how can EVs be cleaner when you charge them with electricity from gas or coal powered generators and have to mine all of the unsustainable raw materials for the batteries. Propaganda at its peak.

 

[Alameda]

Good point, but what happens to nuclear waste? Aah wait, it sets in an underground bunker for 40 or 50,000 years contaminating the ground water. That's a good option? How much waste are we going to generate in 50,000 years. Nope that is worse than gas.

Let's go with solar panels, which produce nothing at night or during storms. Have panels that must be replaced every 15+ years, which fills landfills. I known all of the do-gooders say they last 50 years, but if you have ever owed a solar panel, you know that is a crock. Solor panels start dying the first day of use. Recycling costs 10 times more than the recovered materials. So we still need gas to backup solar panels. Ohh, and the batteries to store solar energy must be replace every 6 years. More child exploitation and environmental damage.

Of course, you forget wind. Yep the blades crap out about every 6 to 15 years, again filling landfills with hazardous material. You also need batteries to store the energy for when it is NOT windy. More child exploitation and environmental damage.

With gas, a natural byproduct Co2 is produced that harms no one. In fact humans breath out Co2 every day, with every breath. And gas is renewable. Every year we find new deposits. New deposits are a natural function of compressing organic matter deep within the earth's crust. In some places natural petroleum oozes right out of the ground. Can't get anymore natural than that.

You're writing as if only solar and wind power have environmental impacts. Every human activity has an environmental impact.
Every single form of electricity generation, except solar, uses a turbine to generate electricity. They wear out and require maintenance and replacement. Hydroelectric power generation is extremely clean, but it requires resources to build a dam and there are environmental impacts, good and bad, from damming rivers.

With all that said, the total environmental impacts of solar and wind power are lowest. And their costs are continually falling. 30 percent of the electricity generated in Texas comes from wind and 50% of the electricity generated in Iowa comes from wind. If oil companies could sell sunlight and wind, there would be no opposition to those technologies.

 

[gtg465x]

What a crock, how can EVs be cleaner when you charge them with electricity from gas or coal powered generators and have to mine all of the unsustainable raw materials for the batteries. Propaganda at its peak.

To put it simply, it's because coal mines + coal power plants + EVs convert raw materials to vehicle movement more efficiently than oil wells + oil refineries + gas transportation + ICE vehicles. ICE vehicles are horribly inneficient at converting gas to movement. If you want to see a full breakdown of the math, this is a great video.

 

[CarAnalogy]

That won’t be the case for long. All the major manufacturers are in the game now. Economies of scale will kick in and EVs will come down in price significantly.

I have to wonder though about the price/scarcity of lithium, and where all that electricity is going to come from.

 

[deconstruct60]

Apple has been coasting since Cook fired Scott Forestall and drove Ive away. It has no hope of a rebound until Cook leaves. He’s Scully 2.0 and the Vision Message Pad proves it.

Drove Ive away? More so the case that Ive was the one of the folks helping to drive the car into the ditch it was stuck in for so long.

" ...
One of many secretive projects that Ive worked on was the so-called Apple Car, according to The Information. The report claims that Ive came up with multiple early prototypes of the autonomous vehicle, including one made out of wood and leather that lacked a steering wheel at Ive's insistence.

Ive instead wanted the vehicle to be controlled by Siri, and to demonstrate the concept to Apple CEO Tim Cook, the report claims a nearby actress pretended to be ‌Siri‌ by responding to voice commands from Apple's executives. It is unclear exactly how this would have worked or how serious Apple was about the idea.
..."

Jony Ive Once Insisted on Apple Car Without a Steering Wheel

Following the big news that Jony Ive will be resigning from Apple later this year after nearly 30 years at the company, new details continue to...

www.macrumors.com

Drive the car with Siri ... seriously? Ive probably was part of the crowd saying "no steering wheel".
That's partially what killed this 'car'. It wasn't ever a basic car. It was always some techno boondoggle of some new gee-whiz. buck rogers future gadget.

The abilities of the autonomous car stuff is WAY , WAY, WAY overblown. Yes there are cars out there "sleepwalking" pretending to be autonomous , but there are lots of half paying attention drivers out there too. Autonomic braking or lane keeping isn't deep cognitive adaptive planning stuff.

 

[The-Real-Deal82]

Why is everyone so shocked. The EV market is bloated and collapsing..

Huh? It’s still in its infancy and growing pretty fast. The biggest selling cars for the last few years have been EV’s. The car industry as a whole has slowed slightly, due to countries in recession, parts shortages due to issues in shipping lanes, and a dip in demand in China. This has affected all types of cars, not just EV’s. They aren’t going away, we’ll all be driving alternatives to ICE vehicles at some point and Apple didn’t pull out due to a failing industry, they pulled out because they are too late.

 

[falainber]

They currently build cars. They are shocked that Apple can't. A company that can't put two ports on an iPad never had any business trying to build a car. Apple never had anything useful to bring to the table.

Xiaomi had been making "self-driving" vacuum robots for several years before they released EV car. Perhaps Apple should try the vacuums too. It's not like they are busy with inventing new products nowadays.

 

[CrysisDeu]

我也没想到他们这么菜

 

[CrysisDeu]

I dont understand the attention of china ev cars. I have been chceking the prices of BYD cars here in EU, in DE. I have a feeling that the prices are on levele like other companies so if incan choose BYD or VW i would choose the VW

BYD is just the “toyota” EV in China. They are extremely cheap. The price in EU is due to lack of competition outside Chinese market and import tax. They are selling at 1/2 or even lower in China.

 

[CrysisDeu]

The problem with EVs in general are the batteries, the charge time and the charging infrastructure. We need much better battery tech where cars can go 500+ miles on an 80% charge, charge from almost empty to 80% in 10 mins and WAYYYYYYY more charging infrastructure. For now, EVs are good for large cities, that's really about it IMO.

Chinese cars are pretty close. 500+ mile range with 20+ minutes ish 80% charging time, and still rapidly improving

 

[CrysisDeu]

I don’t think Apple was ever going to build a car. I think their focus is CarPlay

It’s a bad focus. Software won’t work well without custom hardware

 

[CrysisDeu]

Others EV maker's CEOs questioning what did Apple figure out that they missed. I imagine how many phones rang in China when the news came out. Panicking and regretting their decisions? Interesting to see how this will cascade and the consequences on the EV market; certainly everyone invested billions in R&D trying to get ahead of Apple's unveiling... I am wondering what would have been of the EV world if Apple's Car project would have never existed. I don't think we would have seen so many automakers getting into the "electric-world", without Apple's catalyst effect.

The EV market in China is well beyond that stage.. they’re not worried at all

 

[CrysisDeu]

All of the product people left.

And they are not paying enough as well