Apple's self-driving on the road to transformation will become a new "cash tree"?

One-piece inductor

Recently, according to CNBC, Apple rented six cars from a Hertz site for testing of autopilot software. The model rented is said to be a Lexus SUV. Hertz shares rose 13% as of the close of the day. Let's take a look at the related content with the car electronics editor.

However, Apple subsequently denied the news through CNBC, saying that it has not reached a cooperation agreement with Hertz. Although the cooperation with car rental companies is still confusing, there is no doubt that Apple is accelerating the development of autonomous driving technology.

The reason why Apple wants to “cross-border” into the field of autonomous vehicles has always been the focus of public discussion. Perhaps we can analyze the reasons from a future-oriented perspective. In the future, a car may be more like an electronic device, such as a computer or a smart phone, rather than a traditional car. In this respect, an Apple car will fit perfectly into the company's current ecosystem, and one can easily imagine Apple tying the car to services such as the iPhone or Apple Music. At the same time, the market for autonomous vehicles is also very large, enough to attract large companies like Apple to enter this market.

Apple's self-driving on the road to transformation will become a new "cash tree"?

However, compared with Google and Tesla, it seems that Apple's self-driving car project started a little late, knowing that Google started implementing its own self-driving car project in 2009, and in the same year, Tesla was also Auto-driving was introduced in all of its cars, and it is said that Apple did not open its own Titan project until 2014.

After experiencing the ups and downs of the early stages of development, Apple quickly changed its strategy, and they began to shift their strategic focus from building a truly autonomous car to focusing on building autonomous autonomous driving technology. After the strategy changes, it seems that Apple has finally made progress in the field of autonomous vehicles.

Previously, Apple's autopilot test vehicle had begun road test. Although Apple's self-driving cars are somewhat "rough" compared to competitors such as Google, this does not prevent Apple from demonstrating its actual progress in the field of autonomous driving.

In the emerging field, Apple often catches up with leading competitors through a large number of mergers and acquisitions. For example, Apple has already made frequent acquisitions in artificial intelligence and augmented reality. In the field of automatic driving, Apple seems to have the intention to accelerate the development process by implementing the M&A plan.

Recently, an electric car startup company called "Fisker" entered Apple's sight, and its person in charge was invited by Apple to hold talks. The company has launched an electric car called "Motion", which is said to have reached 650 kilometers on a single charge. The car's exterior design is very refined. And whether Apple will make an acquisition, it still needs to wait for new news. However, this reflects Apple's positive consideration of this approach.

Analysts, including Morgan Stanley and many other organizations, said that the self-driving car system is the first step for Apple to develop a car. After the software is basically formed, Apple is finally launching the car hardware. In the current iPhone, Apple controls the operating system and processor. Other components are solved through a huge supply chain. In the future, Apple may adopt this strategy to master the core components such as the operating system. Parts are solved by external suppliers, and the car has been in existence for more than a hundred years. The supporting industries of various parts and components have matured, and parts are easier to solve than smart phones.

Tim Cook said in an interview with Bloomberg TV: "We focus on the autopilot system, which is a core technology that we think is very important." Cook said that autonomous driving is also one of the biggest challenges of artificial intelligence. "We think it is the mother of artificial intelligence to a certain extent." This reflects Apple's high attention to automatic driving.

Whether autopilots can be the key to continue to push Apple forward, we don’t know, competition with Google and Tesla is very difficult and fierce, and Apple needs to face other traditional automakers and car service providers. Enter the situation in the field of automatic driving.

Of course, compared with the iPhone, the self-driving car is more complicated, and it takes longer for the Apple to invest more. But it took the iPhone 3 years from the secret formation team to come out, Apple is on a more complicated car. It’s also reasonable to spend more than three years in the world. The Apple car that was expected to come out from 2020 to 2021 will be able to take over the iPhone and become Apple’s next cash cow. It will be seen at a time.

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