Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Cars
  3. News

Apple’s latest hire is another piece in the jigsaw for the Apple Car

David Nield
By

Apple Car
Now that we’ve all got over the fact that Apple is making and selling a smartwatch, the rumor mill needs a new product to focus on, and an Apple Car seems to be the most popular choice. We know the company is looking for locations to test some kind of automobile technology, other industry firms have hinted at Apple’s plans, and fans have been working on mock-ups of what the new vehicle might look like.

Now Reuters is reporting that Apple has poached a high-profile senior engineer from Tesla, another company making great strides in the 21st-century motor industry. Jamie Carlson has swapped Elon Musk for Tim Cook in the CEO stakes according to his LinkedIn profile, and given Carlson’s history it would seem to confirm that Apple has plans of some kind in this area. He worked on Tesla’s automated self-driving technologies and before that was busy developing “automotive vision systems” for Gentex Corp.

Recommended Videos

We seem to have reached the “no smoke without fire” stage for the iCar, but exactly what Apple has in the pipeline isn’t yet clear: It could be a brand new electric-powered motor vehicle that can drive itself, or it could be software and various bits of kit to add to your existing car to do the same job. Its CarPlay dashboard software is still in its early stages of development and is likely to play a role in anything else the Cupertino company has to show off as far as cars are concerned.

Reuters points out the other automobile experts Apple has recruited in recent months: Megan McClain from Volkswagen, Carnegie Mellon University researcher Vinay Palakkode, and Nvidia’s Xianqiao Tong, who develops computer vision software for driver assistance systems. With the likes of Google, Nissan, and Tesla developing autonomous technology at a rapid pace, Apple may feel it has no alternative but to get involved.

Editors' Recommendations

Topics
David Nield
David Nield
Contributor
Dave is a freelance journalist from Manchester in the north-west of England. He's been writing about technology since the…
Apple CarPlay feature to offer an easy way to pay for fuel
Apple CarPlay interface

Apple is developing a new CarPlay feature that will let drivers pay for gas via their vehicle’s dashboard.

The feature was quietly unveiled at Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference in early June but went unreported until now.

Read more
The next generation of Apple CarPlay will power your entire car, riding the trend of all-screen autos
Apple CarPlay interface

Apple is taking CarPlay to an entirely new level with a huge announcement at WWDC 2022. In what it called a "sneak peek," Apple showed off an entirely new generation of CarPlay that expands beyond infotainment and becomes the car's entire interface, from a gauge cluster screen to the center stack and including every car function.

Almost every car from the past handful of years has CarPlay, and it's one of the most-requested features from car buyers. Even still, it's a pretty disjointed experience that transports you to an entirely different interface and leaves you jumping back and forth to the car's own operating system anytime you want to perform "car" functions and not entertainment functions. With this shift, that all goes away: Apple wants to make CarPlay the only interface in your car.

Read more
BMW shipping cars without advertised Apple and Google features
2014 BMW M235i back logo

The global chip shortage continues to cause problems for automakers, to the point where some are shipping vehicles without all of their advertised features.

BMW, for example, is shipping some of its new cars without support for Apple CarPlay and Android Auto, according to a recent report by Automotive News.

Read more