In an interview with Bloomberg shortly after the grand unveiling of iOS 11, macOS High Sierra, watchOS 4 and a range of new hardware at WWDC, Tim Cook opened up about Apple’s interest in self-driving car technology, calling electric cars ‘marvellous’ and describing self-driving technology as an ‘incredibly exciting’ field.
The interview was the first time Tim Cook has ever elaborated on Apple’s interest in self driving cars. – Back in April four white Lexus SUV’s, equipped with multiple sensors, cameras, and radar were seen leaving an Apple facility in California. Leading Apple’s autonomous driving efforts is ex-hardware specialist Bob Mansfield who is believed to be the driving force behind the project.
It’s believed that since 2014 Apple has worked with over 1,000 engineers who have been working on different aspects of building an ‘Apple Car’, internally known as ‘Project Titan’. – During the interview, Cook told Bloomberg that the company was currently working on the AI technology rather than an actual vehicle, but didn’t rule anything out.
There is a major disruption looming there […] We’re focusing on autonomous systems, and clearly one purpose of autonomous systems is self-driving cars. There are others, and we sort of see it as the mother of all AI projects. It’s probably one of the most difficult AI projects actually to work on. And so autonomy is something that’s incredibly exciting for us.
While Tim was rather open about Apple’s interest in self-driving car technology, the same openness didn’t show when asked whether the company would make its own Apple car.
We’ll see where it takes us. We’re not really saying from a product point of view what we will do.