Tim Cook announces the iPhone 11.
Source: Apple
Apple CEO Tim Cook hinted at the company’s work in autonomous vehicles, following recent reports that the company is in renewed negotiations to develop its own car.
“Autonomy itself is a core technology, in my opinion. If you take a step back, the car, in many ways, is a robot. An autonomous car is a robot. So there are many things you can do with and we’ll see what Apple does, “Cook said in an interview released on Monday with Kara Swisher on the” Sway “podcast.
“We investigated so many things internally. Many of them will never see the light of day. I’m not saying no,” added Cook.
When asked whether Apple was working on a car or on technology in a car, Cook declined to comment.
“We love to integrate hardware, software and services and find the points of intersection of them because we think that’s where the magic occurs. And that’s what we love to do. And we love having the primary technology around it,” he said.
Apple has long been expected to enter the automotive business with its own vehicle or by selling its technology to other automakers, and has made a series of moves indicating that it planned to do so. Helping to strengthen its engineering ranks, the company acquired the autonomous vehicle startup Drive.ai in 2019.
An autonomous vehicle could position the company against Tesla, which is launching its own autonomous driving capabilities. In 2018, Apple hired Doug Field, then Tesla’s senior vice president of engineering, to presumably work on self-driving cars. Apple also brought in several other former Tesla employees, including former Tesla vice president of engineering Michael Schwekutsch, now senior director of engineering at Apple’s Special Projects Group.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk went so far as to say last year that he once tried to start negotiations to sell the company to Apple, but Cook declined to attend a meeting.
“You know, I never spoke to Elon, although I have great admiration and respect for the company he built. I think Tesla did an incredible job not only establishing the leadership, but maintaining the leadership for a long period of time in the EV space. So, I have a great appreciation for them, “Cook told Swisher.
More recently, CNBC reported that Apple was close to finalizing an agreement with Hyundai-Kia to manufacture an autonomous electric vehicle of the Apple brand at the Kia assembly plant in West Point, Georgia. However, automakers later dropped their claims.
Listen to the full interview with Tim Cook here.
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