I am arguing that your definitions are so broad as to be meaningless. To compare the design of the product and design of the manufacturing process (including things like precision laser drills where Apple bought the company that made them) that Apple does, to the kick starter phones made with off the off the shelf SoCs and parts and say “they are both contract manufacturing“ and so equivalent is just silly.
You got me on case design, milling and manufacturing of them.(though I never brought it up). They definitely go well above and beyond for that aspect of the iPhone. I also misunderstood your comment being on Kickstarter android phones. While I personally doubt they are all cookie cutter / one size fits all boards within them (some likely are the same Chinese boards), I am sure some do fall into that line, similar to budget dash cams and action cameras.
That said Apple actually does utilize, board production, SOC fabrication, and OLED components that come from other companies fabs, not in house. Like these fabs do for their other customers (nVidia, AMD, etc) Apple's products are built specifically for their product, but at the same time work within the limitations, using the technology those manufacturers are skilled in working with. In the end, they still outsource, silly or not.
You say this as if it is incidental to the product.
Apple does not just own the gear used in these contract manufacturers, they design the whole manufacturing process. The contract manufacturers provide bodies and space. Pretty much everything else in the
process comes from Apple.
That link doesn't really bolster your argument, it essentially shows that they go above and beyond and use expensive tooling processes for their cases and they design batteries. It doesn't refute that they buy Qualcom, Samsung, and other components and incorporate them into their SOCs built by TSMC (or similar) and finally assembled by Foxconn.
Apple outsources and uses 3rd party processes for many of their products.
Sorry, my question is not irrelevant it is central. The premise of the discussion was that manufacturing a car is so complex and unlike anything Apple has done as to make it unlikely they will succeed. My point is not that manufacturing a car is easy or simple (although electric cars are much simpler than cars with internal combustion engines), just that it is no more complex than the kind of manufacturing Apple does already, it is just different. Since no one here has yet come up with a clear quantification of complexity of manufacturing and therefore we cannot reach an agreement, I moved back to the underlying question.
But that was the whole point of the discussion. Not some abstract measure of manufacturing complexity, on which no one here seems to be able to agree.
Again, the discussion was not about the phone per se, but about Apple skill in manufacturing and design for manufacturing, hence the example of the watch.
No your question is outside the context I responded to. I responded to specific points you made and specifically / directly addressed only those. You keep bringing up other points and steering the conversation elsewhere.
Your opinion is firm, I can respect that even though I disagree with it.
Completely agree that cars are complex, and that they are different than other things Apple has manufactured.
What you said previously (see below)
They are just different, not more complex. We have been making cars for over 100 years, these are well understood systems. Not to say they are easy, just no more complex.
I have never claimed otherwise. My point is simply that are not more complex than other things that Apple makes, just different.
What is your criteria to consider something complex?
While it is true that electric cars are much easier (not easy, just easier), they are still very large complex systems.
🧐 Yes, yes they are.
They take all the electrical and manufacturing challenges they have previously faced, and add them them into rolling boxes with inertia, chassis flex to consider, air pressurization inside cabins with or without windows opened, impact safety of occupants, climate control, seating comfort, pededistrian safety, longevity in harsh climates, ability to stop, reliability to operate in harsh climates, design, meeting regulatory requirements, battery or fuel range, charging or refueling, dealership / repair networks, in-vehicle component interaction without the risk of cascade failures, exterior lighting (and associated regulations) , interior lighting, entertainment, automated driving (if they include this), and so many, more variables they have never worked with before.
Cars have existed for 100s of years, but Apple has Zero experience with any of it outside of the Talent, patents, or 3rd party products they purchase acquire or License. Putting it all together in a competitive, safe, reliable and affordable package will be one of the most complex and challenging products they have ever produced.
In parallel with your lack of being convinced this is a more complicated challenge than they have ever faced, you or anyone else will have a really hard time convincing me otherwise.
Given how long it took Apple from their first prototype until their first phone, I am not convinced the reason they are not on the market is that car manufacturing is hard. I would guess they are not on the market yet because they have not even figured out if they want to build a car and what exactly their value add will be. Apple likes to figure these things out in private, rather than with early public releases like the GSM card for the Handspring was them trying to understand what people might want in a phone.
Please show me where I claimed that car manufacturing is easy. I have never said that, nor do I believe that. I just think it is no more complex than other things that Apple already does, just different. It will require new people with new expertise, just as each new manufacturing process they have adopted has needed. They have a process for building these things out and if they decide a car it will be one more thing they make.
You responded to points in an ongoing discussion. My response to you, was not intended to be separate from that conversation, but supporting my general points that:
- if Apple decides to build a car (something I still am not convinced is certain), they have and/or can add the needed skills to do it.
- if Apple decides to build a car their measure of success will not be that they are the volume leader or have the largest market share, rather that they will take a disproportionate share of the market‘s profits.
The iPhone was not “a modern replacement for an antiquated feature phone” it was a competitor to years of other companies smart phones with “many complex technical and legal obstacles attached”. Cars have safety standards and related regulations, but the ecosystem into which they fit is pretty simple in that they do not directly interact with other complex systems. All the complexity of a car is internal to the car (at least until we get smart roads), meaning that one gets to mange that complexity any way one wants. By way of clarification (and an extreme simplification) one could decide to build an active suspension because one already has experience with electronics that would be needed, rather than build a passive suspension because one does not have the experience with the mechanical components needed to make that work.
Phones have lots of regulations as well, but also have to directly interact with many networks built with many different companies hardware and software. When Apple wanted to add visual voicemail, that was not just something they could do on their device, but it was something they needed to get AT&T (and eventually other carriers) to make changes to their systems to support.
What makes makes self driving cars hard is that they can only control what they do, rather than force changes that would make this much easier and safer (
e.g. make all traffic control devices transmit a signal that reported their state and let cars in transit request changes based on traffic flow, rather than force smart cars to read their state from signals optimized for human vision).
It is quite clear that we are at an in impasse and and have different opinions on the subject. At the same time, we actually agree on a few things.
I believe that Apple has the capitol , and intelligence to acquire talent and technologies to achieve all of this, and like they overcame small component manufacturing such as phones and watches, they should be experienced enough in problem solving to produce a viable automotive product with the right support & established 3rd party tools / assets.
We are locked in a disagreement on many things, but I (like you) think they can pull this off.
Cheers! 🍻
