Tesla Design Chief on Apple Products: 'There's Nothing to Look Forward To'

[Mr.PT]

They could make cars for ride share and not sell said cars to the general public.

Production should be easy given adequate battery supply. I am still curious about how Apple would deal with the current (independent franchise) dealership laws though.

I think ride share only would avoid these legal constraints, as it would be considered just a service: kind of “upgraded premium uber”, which would be “smashed” in the process alongside it’s current competitors BTW.
Don’t underestimate production complexity, Tesla did and it didn’t turn out that great…I also suspect Apple scaled down initial scale of production, due to difficulty in finding production partner able to supply sufficient units for it. The ones capable weren’t interested.
Ultimately I believe Apple ambitious goal is to change the way we use transportation, the same way iPhone changed the way we communicate. Tesla “just” changed the way vehicles are propelled and sold.

 

[MrAverigeUser]

well... as for me, I take Tesla for the world´s by far most overrated car-company.

BTW: Fraser Perring, the short seller who accused Wirecard AG of fraud years before the German payment processing company’s collapsed, one of the world´s leading short-sellers.....

well, yesterday I read he is already gone short for Tesla shares.....

As for the Tesla-design: ones of the most boring and ugly cars... "ergonomic design" is a foreign word for them... as is esthetic design....

cheers

 

[giggles]

Seems many here agree with him ??‍♂️ And most admired ?????

“Most admired” is a real thing I was quoting. Look it up.

 

[davidh_la]

Hes not wrong though, Since Tim Cook Apple has played it very safe and has not really done a lot of exciting updates to the iPhone for example. The X was the big leap but since then innovation has stalled. The Apple Watch as well. I upgrade annually, but lets be real, Apple has not innovated in a long time.

So true. I upgrade everything and it’s just so ho-hum.

 

[jj10]

I dont know if this was already referenced but.....

"Palm's Ed Colligan laughs off iPhone"​

Palm's Ed Colligan laughs off iPhone

"We've learned and struggled for a few years here figuring out how to make a decent phone," Ed Colligan apparently laughed about with John Markoff last Thursday morning. "PC guys are not going to just figure this out. They're not going to just walk in." Ed, baby, sweetheart, a couple quick...

www.engadget.com

 

[PC_tech]

“Most admired” is a real thing I was quoting. Look it up.

No kidding ?

 

[Morgenland]

Anyone who makes such stupid statements would be fired right away in Europe.
BTW doesn't this man have a European name?

If the Tesla CEO disdains Apple, so does his bootlicker. Disgusting.

 

[Morgenland]

Technical testing bodies in Europe countries (which are actually run by technicians and not lobbyists) ranked the Tesla second to last a few days ago. Every tenth Tesla Model S fails the routine main inspection (TÜV) in Germany due to technical defects. Only the Dacia brand does worse.

In addition to deficiencies in the fog lights and the low beam, the Model S is particularly troubled by problems with the control arms during the main inspection. That is incredibly embarrassing.

 

[TheYayAreaLiving 🎗️]

I had better luck here purchasing Tesla’s Cyber Truck.

 

[44267547]

the guy is obviously narcissistic. “Apple doesn’t have any exciting designs coming”

I think most people seemingly are overlooking the point of this article, it’s not about narcissism or who’s here, I think it’s more about trolling and just trying to anger Apple to instill a reaction.

Look at Teslas trajectory commenting on Apple, most of them have been semi abrasive and condescending. So clearly this is nothing more than a side punch just to prove they (Tesla) are a ‘bigger & better’ company in Silicon Valley.

 

[palmerc]

I have none of those issues at all in my 3. Or my X before. Totally agree with the lack of Carplay / Apple music as a direct source but that is coming at least.

id.3 and 4 are nice - but the UI is terrible and laggy. The eTron is nice to drive but massive outside and tiny inside. I'd have a BMW - but they are all so damn ugly. I mean th iX has to be one of the worst looking cars ever.

Asia's Cars actually look the most interesting.

I have been driving an iD.3 (second time) for about a week so far (keeping it for 2.5 weeks) and I'm still not a fan of the steering wheel haptic controls, but it is wonderful in every other way. I am loving the turning radius and ACC. It actually reliably picks up the road signs - which largely alleviates my need to control speed with my thumb.

OMG, the X. Those silly doors. The 3 is at least a more reasonably sized vehicle. Still, selling any of these cars with the promise of 'fully autonomy' with some future software update is madness. It will never happen.

 

[palmerc]

A new P75D?

Well, technically speaking I suppose it was manufactured in 2019, software up-to-date, premium features, and most importantly in perfect condition, freshly detailed. So there should be no reason for poor performance from the ACC/Autosteer. I've been toying with the idea of buying a Tesla for a couple of years so I periodically rent one. However, my impression/turn-off each time is that the drivetrain is good, supercharging is good, and everything else about the car is cheap, badly designed, or just crap. In particular autosteer is particularly crap in winter.

Now, the drivetrain and supercharging were absolutely enough to qualify it for awesome a couple of years ago. However, you can see the tide turning in Norway with a wide array of new electric models on the road where previously it felt like Tesla was the only electric on the road in 2019. The name of the game now is refinement and manufacture at scale.

 

[palmerc]

I have none of those issues at all in my 3. Or my X before. Totally agree with the lack of Carplay / Apple music as a direct source but that is coming at least.

id.3 and 4 are nice - but the UI is terrible and laggy. The eTron is nice to drive but massive outside and tiny inside. I'd have a BMW - but they are all so damn ugly. I mean th iX has to be one of the worst looking cars ever.

Asia's Cars actually look the most interesting.

As for the BMW styling. My first impression of the iX was shocking in terms of design. However, I feel like every new electric entry feels the need to signal the fact it is an electric car and differentiate itself from the "I just swapped the ICE engine for the Electric". As a few months has passed I definitely like the iX design and think it looks like a charging bull.

I do expect that the big German manufacturers will tone down the styling as soon as the market becomes more mature. A lot of early adopters want to drive a car that screams, "I'm driving an electric car," and the launch designs reflect that. Tesla not having an established design language allowed them to skip that phase. That said, I don't find the look of the Tesla to be groundbreaking, it is going for generic American sports car.

One you didn't mention Polestar 2. My neighbour bought one in all black and it looks quite good.

 

[diamond.g]

Well, technically speaking I suppose it was manufactured in 2019, software up-to-date, premium features, and most importantly in perfect condition, freshly detailed. So there should be no reason for poor performance from the ACC/Autosteer. I've been toying with the idea of buying a Tesla for a couple of years so I periodically rent one. However, my impression/turn-off each time is that the drivetrain is good, supercharging is good, and everything else about the car is cheap, badly designed, or just crap. In particular autosteer is particularly crap in winter.

Now, the drivetrain and supercharging were absolutely enough to qualify it for awesome a couple of years ago. However, you can see the tide turning in Norway with a wide array of new electric models on the road where previously it felt like Tesla was the only electric on the road in 2019. The name of the game now is refinement and manufacture at scale.

So you talked about a model s but it never came in that trim. did you mean model 3? Though it never came in a P75D trim either.

The pre vision only stack works fine in the places you are told you can use it. Outside of those areas it can work, but may not work well. The vision stack does need work, at this point I usually have a pretty good idea when it is going to have issues. I do wish they didn’t dummy down the display when they let folks into early access for Autosteer on City Streets.

 

[Patriks7]

Uh Tesla does the exact same thing to their cars every year.

Came to say exactly this. I‘m quite a car guy, but unless you put them next to each other, I honestly wouldn’t be able to tell you if it’s the first Tesla or the newest one. Can’t say the same about the likes of Mercedes, BMW etc.

 

[diamond.g]

Came to say exactly this. I‘m quite a car guy, but unless you put them next to each other, I honestly wouldn’t be able to tell you if it’s the first Tesla or the newest one. Can’t say the same about the likes of Mercedes, BMW etc.

To be fair, they have changed the interior of all their models in the past two years.

 

[s.r.]

I mean, he is not wrong? Incremental updates year after year, that's their main current development model. Since Retina displays the only significant thing that happened to the Apple ecosystem is the shift from Intel to its own chips. And their MacBook Pros are finally worth their money, after almost 7 years of the fiasco. The rest improvements are just echoes of what the market demands, and usually with the two-year delays(e.g. 120Hz refresh rate).

Nobody says it's a bad thing, the point is it's just not as inspirational or exciting as it used to be. You need to have a very boring life or lack of any other engagement to consider the next iPhone 14, new camera, some other new focus or image processing engine exciting and worth looking forward to.
Updating your iPhone every 4-5 years is the only way to notice any significant difference.

Siri is Apple's weakest product. A glitchy and useless yoke. There is little or no improvement going on. There is no innovation. She meant to be your assistant. A very important addition to the Apple ecosystem to improve our daily life and experience. Instead, we got "I am sorry I can't do that", "This is too loud" when you ask her to lower volume or "Just a moment. Searching .......". A list of predefined answers and responses. You can't count on her. And to avoid getting annoyed, you're better off adding that reminder manualy.

At least Elon sends satellites in space, provides internet through space, progressing with Space X and seriously reshaped the automotive market. For the car world, Elon was Steve Jobs with the first iPhone.

 

[imola.zhp]

I use to check this site multiple times per day, now its once or twice per week. So either he is correct, or I'm just no longer as interested in the latest apple rumors/news. Maybe I'm just getting older or less nerdy, but he kinda isn't wrong. Back when iPhones were still new, every fall was very exciting, same with the Apple Watch. Now I upgrade every 3 years, as opposed to every 2 or a few times yearly; same for other members in my immediate household/family.

It's still an odd comment though because although Tesla does rolling changes, and OTA software updates, they are just as mundane and evolutionary as Apple's.