Apple talks with Mercedes detailed in new Apple Car report

Published

1 year ago

March 6, 2024

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As you may be familiar with by now, Apple has officially canceled its project to build an electric car. The project never saw the light of day and wasn’t even confirmed by Apple, but the company had been working on its own car since 2014. Following reports that Apple had approached Tesla for a partnership, we now know that the company has also talked to Mercedes-Benz about building an Apple Car together.

Apple tried to build an Apple Car with Mercedes-Benz

As reported by Bloomberg on Wednesday, Apple tried to negotiate a partnership with Mercedes-Benz to build an Apple Car. The report says that talks “progressed further” for months and both companies had been actively working on an electric car project together. However, while Mercedes would build the Apple Car, it also wanted to sell its own cars using Apple’s self-driving platform.

Apple eventually withdrew from the partnership as the company’s executives were confident that Apple could build a car on their own after all the early work with Mercedes. The company also reportedly discussed with Ford the possibility of the car manufacturer selling an Apple Car under its Lincoln brand, but the talks “didn’t progress past an early meeting.”

In the past, Apple had some discussions with Elon Musk about buying Tesla to build its car. However, Apple CEO Tim Cook reportedly pulled the plug on the deal during early negotiations. At some point, Apple executives met with Musk again to discuss other ways of collaborating, such as buying batteries from Tesla.

Interestingly, Bloomberg says that Apple came close to a deal to buy luxury automaker McLaren. At the time, Jony Ive was still working for the company and would get a new design studio in London to work on the project. The deal didn’t go ahead either.

iOS 16.4 beta hints at Car Key feature dropping NFC support in the future

The idea of an Apple Car came from Steve Jobs

Although the Titan project (the codename for the Apple Car) emerged in 2014, the idea came from Apple co-founder Steve Jobs years ago. “In the wake of the 2008 financial crisis, with American car companies on the brink of failure, the Apple chief executive even floated the idea of acquiring General Motors Co. for pennies on the dollar,” the report says.

Tony Fadell, considered the father of the iPod, confirmed that he and Jobs talked about “what would be this generation’s new Volkswagen Beetle.” However, as the company focused on making the iPhone a hit, Jobs decided it wasn’t time to start a car project.

An ambitious project

Under Cook’s direction, the Titan project was quite ambitious. One of the prototypes looked like a white minivan with “rounded sides, an all-glass roof, sliding doors and whitewall tires.” The vehicle would have a giant screen, a powerful audio system, and reclining seats that made the cabin look like a club.

The Apple Car was first designed to have a Level 5 autonomous driving system, meaning that it would drive itself entirely using its onboard computer with no steering wheel or pedals. The only manual controls would be a “video-game-style controller or iPhone app” which would serve as a backup.

Doug Field, head of the project, warned executives about the challenges of building an autonomous car and suggested scaling back the goals to Level 3, which requires a human driver to take control in some situations. However, Apple executives still wanted a Level 5 car.

Frustrations over the car’s project

The project hadn’t made much progress by 2016 and the board of directors was already questioning the viability of the Apple Car. Dan Riccio then convinced Bob Mansfield, known for his role in Apple’s hardware team, to join the car team. Mansfield focused on working on the autonomous driving system rather than the car itself.

Some executives believed that Apple could license its technologies to other car manufacturers. Mansfield and Cook agreed to build a self-driving shuttle in partnership with Volkswagen to be used by Apple employees on its campus. However, the project was seen as a distraction and was also shut down.

The report says that many Apple executives have been frustrated by Cook’s indecision over the direction of the Titan project. In the meantime, as the project was going nowhere, engineers hired to work on the car were leaving Apple to work for other companies. From 2016 to 2018, Apple had already laid off 120 people from the car project.

Sources told Bloomberg that Apple has estimated the production cost of its car at around $120,000, far above the target of $85,000.

Apple Car is cancelled reaction | Close-up of engine start/stop button

The end of the Apple Car

Apple has made a lot of changes to the leadership of the Titan project since then, but none of them have resulted in anything promising. At one point, Apple put a fleet of Lexus SUVs customized with its own self-driving technology on the streets for testing purposes. The plan was to expand these tests to more cities by 2024. The company wanted to sell self-driving as a subscription service.

Last year, before giving up on the project for good, the designers and engineers decided to experiment with a Level 2 autonomous car – the same as the Tesla Autopilot. But that would make the Apple Car look like any other electric car already available on the market without much of a difference.

Kevin Lynch is said to have convinced Apple’s leadership that building a fully autonomous car would take at least another decade. Earlier this year, Cook was already considering shutting down the project as key engineers and executives were already joining other companies.

On February 26, around 2,000 Apple employees received an email about a meeting the following day. Lynch and Williams then confirmed that the Titan project was being shut down without further explanation. Some of the engineers have been relocated to Apple’s AI and software division.

The failed car project cost Apple around $1 billion a year. Be sure to read the full article with even more details about the Apple Car project.

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Tesla (TSLA) brings back FSD transfer, offers $2,000 loyalty discount amid demand crisis

Published

1 hour ago

April 25, 2025

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Tesla (TSLA) is reintroducing Full Self-Driving (FSD) transfers and offering $2,000 loyalty discounts on the new Model Y to existing owners amid a demand surge.

Yesterday, we reported that Tesla is starting to have new Model Y inventory in the US, just weeks after launching the updated vehicle.

Now, Tesla has pulled new demand levers to drive sales of these vehicles.

First, last night, Tesla began sending emails to early Model Y owners in the US, offering them a $2,000 discount on upgrading to the new Model Y.

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This is an unusual type of discount for Tesla and a significant one.

On top of the direct loyalty discount, Tesla also announced that it is bringing back “FSD transfer” on all vehicles in the US:

‘Vox populi, Vox Dei’. Tesla says that it’s by popular demand that it is coming back, but that’s true. It’s because Tesla needs it.

If it were by popular demand, FSD transfer would always be available to Tesla owners as long as Tesla hasn’t delivered on its promise of delivering unsupervised full self-driving. That would simply be the right thing to do and what most owners, who are not also Tesla shareholders, have been asking for years.

But instead, Tesla is using its own inability to deliver a product it promised and sold as a way to create more demand for its newer vehicles.

In the summer of 2023, CEO Elon Musk finally agreed to allow FSD transfers after owners had asked him for years, but not because it was the right thing to do. Instead, he said it would be a “one-time amnesty” for a single quarter. Tesla used this to boost sales in the quarter.

Tesla ended up bringing back the incentive four more times when it needed to boost orders, making Musk a liar for saying it would only be for a quarter. By claiming it’s only for this one time, Tesla is creating urgency in trying to get people to upgrade – instead of doing the right thing and offering everyone who bought FSD the ability to transfer until Tesla actually delivers on its promise.

Electrek’s Take

‘Vox populi, Vox Dei’. That’s funny. It’s Latin for “the voice of the people, the voice of God.” But it should be more “vox necessitatis, vox pecuniae,” which is “the voice of necessity, the voice of money.”

That’s not by popularity. If Tesla were doing what owners wanted and what is right, FSD transfer would be permanent and available to any Tesla owner who purchased the FSD package, until Tesla delivers on what it promised.

Tesla is doing this now because it needs it. It already has no backlog of orders for the new Model Y in the US and it is testing out these incentives before going back to offering 0% financing, likely in the coming weeks.

Something interesting to note is that these incentives are both technically loyalty incentives, as they apply to existing owners.

Tesla used to have incredible customer loyalty, but that has changed in the last few months due to Elon Musk.

I’d be curious to see how successful they are and if it can convince some people who swore off Tesla because of Musk to actually get another one.

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Wheel-E Podcast: Tenways cargo e-bike, Lime mopeds, EUCs, more

Published

3 hours ago

April 25, 2025

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Wheel-E Podcast: Tenways cargo e-bike, Lime mopeds, EUCs, more

This week on Electrek’s Wheel-E podcast, we discuss the most popular news stories from the world of electric bikes and other nontraditional electric vehicles. This time, that includes a new cargo e-bike launch from Tenways, Lime bringing its new e-bike and e-moped to its larger fleets, testing a 100 mile e-bike, California’s e-bike vouchers are set to open again in another lottery round, a new electric unicycle from InMotion, and more.

Today’s episode is brought to you by retrospec—makers of sleek, powerful e-bikes and outdoor gear built for everyday adventure. Electrek listeners can get 10% off their next ride until May 8th with the exclusive code ELECTREK10 only at retrospec.com.

The Wheel-E podcast returns every two weeks on Electrek’s YouTube channel, Facebook, Linkedin, and Twitter.

As a reminder, we’ll have an accompanying post, like this one, on the site with an embedded link to the live stream. Head to the YouTube channel to get your questions and comments in.

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After the show ends, the video will be archived on YouTube and the audio on all your favorite podcast apps:

We also have a Patreon if you want to help us to avoid more ads and invest more in our content. We have some awesome gifts for our Patreons and more coming.

Here are a few of the articles that we will discuss during the Wheel-E podcast today:

Here’s the live stream for today’s episode starting at 9:00 a.m. ET (or the video after 10:00 a.m. ET):

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Environment

Redditor: my Polestar 2 window stopped a bullet from hitting me [pictures]

Published

13 hours ago

April 25, 2025

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Redditor: my Polestar 2 window stopped a bullet from hitting me [pictures]

This one’s pretty simple, kids – it’s exactly what it says on the tin: a Polestar 2 owner took to the Polestar subreddit this week claiming that the window glass in his new EV actually stopped a bullet from hitting him. Plus, he says he’s got the pictures to prove it. (!)

The brand may be evolving into its own, but the OG Polestar 1 and Polestar 2 were little more than hot electric versions of Volvo cars – and Volvo cars are known throughout the world for their secure, planted feel on the road and absolutely bananas high-tensile steel safety cages. As such, it should come as no surprise that the Polestar 2 is one of the safest sedans on the road today … but is the car really bulletproof?

That’s what one redditor is claiming after his window was hit by what they believed to be a stray bullet just five days after taking delivery.

Polestar stopped a bullet.
byu/CptMerica29 inPolestar

Now, as the growing brand rivalry between Polestar fans and their Tesla-driving counterparts might lead you to expect, some of the comments are pretty pointedly referencing Tesla – and pretty funny. Here are a few of my favorites:

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Comment
byu/CptMerica29 from discussion
in Polestar

Now, that was fun, sure – but it’s worth noting that a number of commenters claiming alternately that there’s no way this was a .22 caliber bullet (certainly not a .22 WMR) or that it was a stray shot from very far away. The consensus seems to be that a .177 caliber air gun pellet is most likely to blame, but my money is on a small piece of stone or gravel kicked up at a weird angle from a nearby vehicle.

Regardless, it seems like CptMerica29 is A-OK, and their Polestar 2 hardly seems worse for wear, either. Here’s hoping it’s the last time we have to have a debate about what kind of bullet was being fired at an EV driver for a long time.

If you’d like to try your hand at driving a Polestar 2 through a volley of flying debris and other assorted projectiles and letting us know how you do, click the link below to score a great deal on one near you (while you still can):

Disclaimer

I would like to believe this is obvious, but there’s a “do not use batteries as toothpaste” sticker on this pack of Duracell batteries for a reason, so I’m going to err on the side of caution here and tell any of you reading the above and taking it seriously that: I am kidding. That was a joke.

To be clear, it is my position that NO VEHICLE this side of a Mercedes-Benz EQS GUARD or Inkas Armored S Class is actually bulletproof – and that, yes, a .22 is a real gun with plenty of lethal stopping power and, also yes, a pellet gun can and has killed a lot of people. DO NOT SHOOT AT CARS, and do not sit in your cars and let others shoot at you if you can at all avoid it.

As getsome75 so eloquently puts it: