By
Godfrey Benjamin
March 22nd, 2024
Apple doesn’t confirm its work on an electric vehicle although obvious facts speak for themselves.
It has been much talked about over the last year that Apple is working on an electric vehicle. However there has been neither confirmation from the company itself, nor clear evidence.
At least we can say for sure that Apple does delve into the auto industry. It has become much more obvious after its discussions with a secure Bay Area testing facility for connected and autonomous vehicles and August meeting with the California DMV to review self-driving vehicle regulations.
Apple has hired experienced engineers from Tesla, Ford, GM, Samsung, Nvidia. Coincidence? We must say, it’s highly improbable! This all might appear to be parts of Apple’s “Car project”, it is also informally called “Project Titan”. Allegedly Apple has a special team working on an electric vehicle.
The most recent information says that iPhone maker has registered automobile-related domain names apple.car, apple.cars and apple.auto. Whois records updated on January 8 confirm that Apple registered the domains through sponsoring registrar MarkMonitor Inc. in December 2015.
However the addresses are not yet active. There is a possibility that the domain names are related to Apple’s CarPlay, which lets drivers access contacts on their iPhones, make calls or listen to voicemails while continuing driving.
These recent domain registrations are just three out of thousands owned by Apple. It has more than 10,000 registered domains, while [email protected] is associated with more than 13,000, and [email protected] is associated with nearly 4,000.
The auto industry attracts much attention nowadays. Kevin Ashton, creator of the term ‘Internet of Things’, predicts that in 15 years almost everybody will use self-driving vehicles, which is, in turn, a vivid example of the powerful and developing Internet of Things at work.
Indeed the latest survey conducted by the World Economic Forum and the Boston Consulting Group, confirms the fact – consumers are ready to try self-driving cars. The research included either focus groups in Singapore, Berlin, and London, or online surveys with city dwellers in 10 different countries.
The study’s authors were even surprised by the number of those who wanted to buy autonomous cars. Gilles Le Borgne, Executive Vice President, Research and Development for PSA Peugeot Citroën, says: “I am proud to see the autonomous vehicle developed by our teams in the Paris region technical centers crossing borders in Europe. This technological feat is a critical step towards shaping the mobility of the future.”
CES 2016 conference unveiled NVIDIA DRIVE PX 2, a new powerful computer by Nvidia developed to allow cars driving in an autonomous mode. One of the key features is that the computer will allow self-driving cars to detect various objects on the road, including other vehicles, pedestrians and traffic signals. The invention is expected to become generally available in the Q4 of 2016, while some partners will be able to get samples of an engine in Q2 of 2016.