For years there have been speculations that Apple is working on a car. According to rumors, the company has a large team of engineers and designers that has been tasked with reimagining personal transportation. Reportedly, the initiative has seen a number of setbacks, conflicting priorities and uncertainty about core technologies, and the outside world has no idea what that product would be and which problems it might try to solve.
I have no idea what a hypothetical Apple Car could be. But what I know is that the current world of transportation has a number of pain points for me personally, and is ripe for rethinking. And I wouldn’t be surprised if Apple’s rumored transportation initiative would attempt to leverage this opportunity.
Rethinking car ownership
I hate the concept of owning a car. I used to own a car a few years back, and it wasn’t the most thrilling experience. Sure, the freedom of being able to go anywhere 24/7 and not being dependent on anything or anyone else is very comforting, but more often that not, I actually didn’t need it. Most of the time I used my car to drive to the same places during the same time periods (office, home, groceries store, etc.), and my car would end up being parked for hours, days, or even weeks on end in between these commutes. This is not efficient and not great for spaces, communities, and environment. Having a car attached to one person exclusively is a terrible concept for society.
In addition to the efficiency issue, owning a car can also bring a number of headaches. You need to have parking spaces around places you regularly go to. You need to pay a ton of taxes and fees. Occasionally something in your car would break and you need to deal with servicing (which is often super costly). Owning a car sometimes becomes a part-time job in itself.
As long as one lives in urban environments with developed public transportation, driving somewhere, let alone having a car, is rarely a better option. And in those communities where there is no luxury of public transportation, it becomes increasingly popular to use ride sharing services or car rentals for short periods of time. Not only not owning (or long term leasing) a car might be a cheaper option for many people, it’s a much more efficient way to utilize vehicles, as they can be used by many people through the course of the day. By sharing cars our society would need fewer cars per capita, our communities would need less parking space, and our planet would be less polluted.
While I do believe that Apple is actually designing a car as an object, I’m not convinced that Apple will actually sell these cars to consumers. Instead, I can imagine how Apple Car would be a service, not a product.
Automation and democratization of transportation
I mentioned how I’ve never been thrilled with the idea of owning a car. Another thing I’m not a huge fan of is driving a car. Sure, there are people who actually enjoy the process of pushing pedal to the metal and cruising Californian landscapes watching colorful sunsets, but most of us use cars for purely practical purposes of getting from A to B, and quite often it’s a stressful and dangerous experience of watching other cars and pedestrians, avoiding reckless drivers and tailgaters, merging on highways, getting stuck in traffic and squeezing between other cars when parking.
Today, you need driver license to even legally operate a car (obtaining which takes a lot of time, money, and nerves) and you need to be quite experienced to drive a car without constant stress — as such, this is not a democratized process. It reminds me of the computers in the 80s which could only be operated by trained personnel — but then personal computer era came and changed everything; today (mostly thanks to Apple’s efforts over decades), everyone has and can operate a personal computer, whether it’s a laptop, a phone or a tablet. While it’s unclear when (and if) we’re ever going to achieve full self-driving autonomy, I’m assuming Apple’s long term vision is to pursue and master this technology so that everyone — not only privileged and trained drivers — can use an Apple Car. Transition is going to be long and painful, but the endgame is roads filled with self-driving cars only, cars that can “talk” to each other, connect into a seamless mesh network and thus greatly reduce (if not eliminate altogether) the risk of accidents. More often than not, stupid and reckless human drivers cause car accidents, not self-driving technology.
In this imaginary world of self-driving cars which we don’t even need to own anymore, Apple Car could be a service that’s always available to us and is one tap away. You would open an app on your device or ask Siri, and a few minutes later, an Apple Car, already set up for you, would arrive at your door, ready to go wherever you need — similarly to how we use Uber and Lyft nowadays. You could rent such car for short or longer term periods, paying by an hour or by a day, which would be a much more seamless and pleasant experience compared to traditional car rental or car sharing services, since with Apple Car, you would have a very predictable experience available to you 24/7. There is never a guess which car is available, and for how much. With Apple Car, it would be as simple and consistent as using your iPhone over days, months and years — everything is familiar and user friendly.
Granted, the vision I outlined above is many years away from reality, if ever. It assumes significant breakthroughs in automation, a vast network of available cars and service centers, and there are huge questions about whether such a service would even be financially sustainable for Apple (or any other company).
Apple ecosystem differentiation
There is no doubt in my mind that an Apple Car would be an EV. I’m not under illusion that EVs are 100% environmentally friendly, but they are still an improvement over ICE cars, obviously, and Apple is a very environmentally conscious company. But the key reason why Apple might be interested in designing a car is that EVs are essentially computers on wheels, and Apple is a computer company. Computers have “eaten” our offices and homes, our media players, our TVs, phones, readers, headphones, speakers and so much more — and now, they are “eating” cars. Modern, especially high-end cars, are differentiated by software and sensors — driving these cars is a much safer, more pleasant experience. Obviously, Tesla has been a trail blazer in this regard, but many other companies have caught up.
However, current experience is still fractured, and there is a great opportunity for Apple to expand its full ecosystem of software and services to their car, so the best way to do it would be to own and control the whole widget. Today, I need to install an app to operate a car, and iPhone would try to talk to the car via Bluetooth, and we all know how unreliable Bluetooth can be. Such app is self-contained experience, not embedded with the entire ecosystem.
With a hypothetical Apple Car, I can imagine how smooth and seamless the experience could be. Your car and your phone (and your laptop computer, and your spatial computer, etc.) would be made by the same company, and they would constantly talk to each other. You would be able to lock and unlock your car via Face ID on your phone. Instead of Bluetooth, your iPhone would be able to connect and sync with your car quickly and reliably due to Apple silicon, similarly to how AirPods and HomePods work currently. And then think about the integration with the software and services ecosystem. You would be able to plan your route with Apple Maps while sitting in front of your Mac at home. You would be able to control and monitor the settings of your car via a Home Screen widget on any of your devices. Your car will be aware of (and react to) upcoming weather changes via the Weather app. You will be able to see your car in the Find My app. App Store will unlock a new world of apps designed for “carOS”. Many of these use cases already exist today thanks to CarPlay (which, by the way, has become a critical part of modern car driving experience), but they will work much better within the same ecosystem of hardware and software.
Personalization of a car
I mentioned above how calling an Apple Car would result in getting not just a random car at your door, but a car that’s already tailored to your experiences and preferences. But how is it going to work? Today, we personalize cars by owning them and tuning them to or preferences. With Apple Car, it’s possible that the car would automatically adapt to you. It’s very similar to how many different people can use the same Mac, but the settings, wallpapers and apps are entirely different depending on who is logged in. With Apple Car, when you’re using it, the car would log into your iCloud account and would remember your settings between rides — things like the specific position of seats, configuration of mirrors, the position and settings of the widgets on the dashboard, and much more. Obviously, all your apps and services will be there, so you’ll have your Apple Music playlists and Apple Podcasts ready, Apple Maps already set for your trip, and all your apps from the App Store one tap away. You might be able to set up multiple profiles, such as riding to the office, going on a family trip, and so on. All these settings and personalization options would save and sync in the cloud. The moment you stop using an Apple Car, it will adapt for the next user, and then when you need a car again, it will log back into your account, ready to go.
The concept above might sound horrific to many people who love to own, customize and express themselves through their cars. But think about it — millions of people used to express themselves through wearing different kinds of watches, and yet today, the most popular watch in the world is Apple Watch, all of which (except for bands and watch faces) look and work exactly the same. We all felt like we wanted to have cool unique phones like these weird Nokia devices, and yet iPhones are hugely popular globally. For a large number of people, consistency and predictability of the experience is a huge plus, and I can see how having such consistency in a driving and riding experience would be a huge enabler and anxiety reduction factor.
Another idea to consider is how Apple Car might work with (or compliment) Apple Vision. Today, Vision Pro is clearly positioned as a device that you would primarily use indoors (at home or in the office), but it’s only a matter of time before the product category would evolve to an extent when you’d wear spatial computers outdoors as well. Driving a car while wearing a future Apple Vision product might be hugely beneficial — right in front of your eyes you could see a map overlay and turning and merging tips, traffic info, speed limit info and so many other helpful tips. Your car would be able to seamlessly “talk” to Apple Vision, so that you would see mirror views and 3D positioning view of your car on the road as separate floating windows in front of you. Or, if you think even more futuristic, you won’t even need Apple Vision in the car, since the entire Apple Car windshield would be a transparent AR display itself.
As cars turn into computers, Apple is greatly positioned to capitalize on this trend by yet again leveraging their famous integration of hardware, software and services. Apple already has a hugely popular platform of apps, loyal developers and a robust selection of first party services critical for the car experience, and it’s exciting to think about where Apple might take personal transportation.
