The tech giant has been having talks with the German automakers over the production of its secret electric car
According to German news site Handelsblatt, Daimler and BMW have ended the negotiations with Apple Inc. over the rumored electric car, dubbed as Project Titan. Although the tech giant hasn’t openly admitted about developing an electric car however the sources close to the matter has hinted about the ongoing project every now and then.
The tech giant had needed a reliable partner for working on the anticipated project of self-autonomous car and that is why it had been having talks with the German automaker giants. However, the negotiations ended in a deadlock over few disagreements between the automakers and the tech titan.
The disagreement sprung over the control of power and data. Where Apple wanted the vehicle to be built into its own cloud software, the German automakers had strong stance regarding the customers’ data protection.
Last year, representatives of Apple had visited BMW’s headquarters –situated in Munich –to tour the company’s factory –situated in Leipzig –to look at the procedures involved in creating the company’s i3 electric car. It was rumored then that the iPhone maker intended to use BMW i3 as the premise for its electric car project. But, subsequently, within few months, the Silicon Valley tech titan and BMW talks decelerated. Whereas, Daimler –the company involved in manufacturing the prestigious Mercedes-Benz –ended most recently.
Apple has not officially announced anything regarding this current ongoing process. But the company’s executives have never denied the possibility of an electric car. In fact, when the tech giant’s core product’s, iPhone, sales declined, the company urged the investors and analysts that it has other plans of generating the revenue. On Apple’s 40th anniversary, Apple’s co-founder Steve Wozniak, in an interview to CNBC, had expressed that although the market for smartphones have been saturated the company can come a long way by adopting to the new technologies which include augmented and virtual reality and self-autonomous cars.
Moreover, Magna –a Canadian-Australian-based automotive manufacturer is actively involved in the development of Apple’s car. Rumors have it that few of the executives from Apple have visited Austria to hold talks with Magna Steyr and up till no such news of the talks getting disrupted have been come to the surface.
According to Frankfurter Allgemeine –a German publication –the Cupertino, Calif. firm has established a “secret lab” in Berlin where it has hired a small team of around 15-20 engineers who had previously worked in German car companies. Additionally, hundreds of employees in California as well are secretly working on the project.
The tech leviathan has also been searching for the car executives in the US as well. Recently, it poached former vice president of Tesla’s vehicle engineering, Chris Porritt. The move came after around four months the departure of Steve Zadesky from the company who had once been leading the Project Titan. When Zadesky was departing, sources familiar to the matter has said that the head was under immense pressure of speeding up the project which apparently couldn’t be completed in the given deadline. The tech giant is said to complete the project in 2019 or 2020.
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