Apple self-driving car to launch in 2025

Apple plans to launch their self-driving electric vehicle, the Titan, in 2025, according to recent reports. 

Apple has been working on the vehicle since 2014, but until recently few details have emerged of the project. It’s been kept extremely hush-hush, with executive departures and appointments as its senior team has changed being used as a proxy for its progress. 

The Titan, which will have no steering wheel or pedals, will be completely designed for hands-off driving, potentially featuring a U-shaped seating formation where passengers can relax. The car’s interior may look similar to the “lifestyle” model by Canoo, an electric vehicle startup, which features a U-shaped design. 

Apple has faced a range of challenges when entering the competitive electric vehicle market, including senior management changes at Titan and their ambitious targets.

 If Titan, led by Apple Watch software executive Kevin Lynch, is to be ready in four years then the company has to pull off their self-driving system within this timeframe, a hefty challenge to say the least. Even those working on the project according to Bloomberg were sceptical of this timeline, despite recent promising progress like the development of advanced sensors, processors chips and the underlying self-driving system. 

Self-driving cars have been around for several years now, with Elon Musk, becoming the world’s richest man as the CEO of Tesla, which sells a self-driving car of the same name. 

However, consumers have expressed hesitancy about the move to automated vehicles, especially considering Tesla has been in the news over crashes that killed passengers and pedestrians whilst their car was in auto-drive. However, part of this is sensationalist reporting designed to appeal to readers fear of having no control in a self-driving car. There is evidence that autonomous vehicles are in many ways significantly safer than human-driven cars, purely because they take accidents involving human error, which causes most accidents, out of the equation. 

Regardless, aware of this press, Apple is being extremely meticulous about the safety and mechanics of the Titan, putting their prototype vehicle through a series of undisclosed tests and scenarios. 

If it isn’t ready in time, the company may either push back the release date or sell the car initially with less sophisticated technology. Both of these compromises aren’t decisions Apple wants to make. 

Dan Ives, an analyst at US investment firm Webusgh securities believes that “it's a matter of when, not if, Apple enters the EC (electric vehicle) race.” The company could benefit from teaming up with rivals like Volkswagen or Tesla, considering the scale of the manufacturing challenge. 

With the existential threat of climate change and the far greater sustainability of an electric car as opposed to a gas or diesel-powered vehicle, we can only hope electric vehicles become more affordable and sustainable.