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Written | Edited by Zhang Yu | Yang Bocheng
Source: DoNews
Apple’s entry into the in-vehicle system track has accelerated again.
According to information on Apple’s official website, Apple is currently recruiting automotive experience partner engineers in Beijing, Shanghai and Shenzhen. Apple says the role is an intermediate role between technical engineering and project management, providing technical design and development guidance, handling certification records for the entire car experience program (including CarPlay and car keys in Wallet) and promoting Apple and global automotive Communication between industry projects.
Previously, at the 2022 Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) held on June 7, the new generation of CarPlay in-vehicle system was unveiled in the form of PPT for more than three minutes. Emily Schubert, Apple’s senior manager of automotive experience engineering, said that 98 percent of U.S. cars can use CarPlay, and 79 percent of U.S. consumers say they will only buy CarPlay-enabled cars, and “the first The next-generation CarPlay-enabled car will be officially released by the end of 2023.”
Unlike the old version of CarPlay, which only provided simple entertainment and navigation functions, the new generation of CarPlay can connect more deeply to the underlying core data of the car to control functions such as navigation, radio, air conditioning, telephone, seat heating, etc. Clear data display, including driving speed, fuel level, interior temperature, etc. At the same time, Apple has also redesigned the UI interface of CarPlay to adapt to screens of various sizes and provide a variety of different card layouts.
Apple said that the new generation of CarPlay will fundamentally change the way people interact with cars. “We have been working with automakers to reshape the in-car experience on all driver screens.”
An auto industry source told DoNews (ID: ilovedonews) that from Apple’s release of a new generation of CarPlay in-vehicle system to the increasing emphasis on its user experience, it may indicate that Apple is preparing to leverage the entire auto industry from a software perspective, ” Apple doesn’t announce plans to build cars, but it wants to turn all cars into ‘Apple cars’.”
In fact, every time Apple enters a new industry, it mostly chooses to start from the software point of view that it is good at. For example, Apple launched HealthKit and Health applications, and then Apple Watch was unveiled. It also launched HomeKit, and then HomePod smart Speakers turned out.
But this time, Apple’s entry into the automotive industry from a software perspective is a helpless move. As a pioneer from the smartphone industry into the automotive industry, Apple has not only produced no output since 2014, but even the automotive project team has experienced several crises and was even forced to disband.
On March 16, Tianfeng International Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo posted on Twitter that the Apple car project team has been disbanded for some time, and in order to achieve the goal of mass production by 2025, Apple Car needs to be reorganized within 3-6 months. .
Bloomberg analyst Mark Gurman (Mark Gurman) also said in the “Power On” column that Joe Bass, the head of software engineering project management for Apple’s automotive team, has left Apple to join Facebook as a VR technology. Project Management Director. With the departure of Buss, the car management team that Apple formed a year ago almost died in name, and all the executives left. Gurman said bluntly that 2022 will be a critical year for the success or failure of Apple’s car project. If Apple is still planning to launch a fully self-driving car in 2025, it needs to act soon.
However, Apple has not completely given up trying to break through from a hardware perspective. In a June issue of Power On, Gurman revealed that Apple is negotiating supply chain agreements for auto parts and overall manufacturing. And Kevin Lynch, the new head of Apple’s car program, has brought in several lieutenants from the Apple Watch team to help develop the car and restructure the car management team.
In the case that the car building is not going well, can Apple first use CarPlay to achieve “curve overtaking”?
Software first, Apple intends to manufacture vehicles?
Software capability is one of Apple’s core competencies. CarPlay once occupied an absolute leading position in the vehicle system market. According to Apple, in 2020, more than 80% of new cars sold around the world support CarPlay. According to Haitong International data, as of the end of 2021, CarPlay has cooperated with more than 70 car companies around the world on 720 models, leading competitors such as Baidu CarLife, Huawei HiCar, Tencent Automobile Association and Ali AliOS, and its strength should not be underestimated.
After the release of the new generation of CarPlay, Xiaopeng Motors founder and CEO He Xiaopeng believes, “CarPlay is a very good solution in this generation of cars, while the next-generation smart car solutions require more comprehensive full-stack self-development and ecological construction. “
Jidu Automobile CEO Xia Yiping and He Xiaopeng agreed with the point of view. He further pointed out that CarPlay is to solve the intelligentization of non-smart cars, but the future smart cars will be more and more deeply integrated in software and hardware, which is an era of smart cars. biggest change.
Xia Yiping pointedly pointed out the existing defects of CarPlay, that is, CarPlay does not involve hardware manufacturing, its software and hardware integration is poor, and more often it just acts as a savior for traditional fuel vehicles and non-smart trams. This is indeed the case. In the list of cooperation announced by Apple, more than ten traditional fuel vehicle companies such as Land Rover, Porsche, Nissan, Ford, Lincoln, Audi, Jaguar, Volvo, and Honda are listed.
In the era of smart cars, the new generation of CarPlay can indeed become a boon for many traditional fuel car companies. Traditional fuel car companies that have shortcomings in the in-vehicle system can even completely abandon the research and development and localization of the in-vehicle system and directly choose to connect to CarPlay. .
However, the problem is that, to access the new generation of CarPlay, it is necessary to open the underlying core data to Apple. Based on the huge Apple user group, CarPlay will even dominate the audience and become one of the selling points of traditional fuel car companies. In this way, CarPlay has become the soul. , while traditional fuel car companies have been reduced to the shell, subject to Apple. At the same time, for Apple, obtaining the underlying core data also means that it has taken a key step in understanding hardware and accumulated relevant experience in its vehicle manufacturing.
More and more car companies are aware of the potential danger. Before that, CarPlay’s global market share was over 50%, but now its global market share has fallen to 30%. At present, both new energy car companies such as Tesla, NIO, Xiaopeng Motors, and Ideal Auto, as well as traditional fuel car companies in transition such as BYD, Great Wall, Geely, and Changan, have given up CarPlay and launched Self-developed in-vehicle system.
“Obviously, Apple’s next step must be vehicle manufacturing.” The above-mentioned auto industry insiders believe that, unlike Huawei, which has always claimed to only help car companies build good cars, Apple has been determined to manufacture complete vehicles from the very beginning. The system is far from satisfying its appetite.
Apple’s vehicle manufacturing has long been no secret. In 2014, Apple launched the “Titan Project”, focusing on hardware and dedicated to vehicle manufacturing. The project was led by Steve Zadesky, the leader of the original iPod team. In order to achieve the goal, Apple A car team of 1,000 people has been formed, and people have been poached with high salaries from Google, Tesla, Mercedes-Benz, Ford and other car companies.
However, the Titan plan did not go well. In the past 8 years, 4 leaders of the Apple car project have resigned, internal conflicts and management problems have occurred frequently. It was not until the end of 2020 that Apple announced the restart of the car manufacturing plan. Despite the turbulence, the car business is Apple’s A city that must be captured. Analysts from American investment research firm Baird pointed out in a research report that the auto market is a multi-trillion-dollar market with huge long-term growth opportunities. Apple’s entry into the auto industry is likely to usher in a growth of about $40 billion.
In fact, Apple’s strength cannot be ignored. According to incomplete statistics, from 2015 to 2021, Apple has obtained nearly 200 patented technologies related to automobiles, including autonomous driving technology, battery technology, wireless charging technology, etc. It is also worth mentioning that Apple’s self-developed car chip is regarded as the biggest killer. It is reported that the car chip consists of a neural network processor, and Apple’s internal silicon engineering team is responsible for the design work. In addition, Apple’s self-driving system research and development. has entered a critical stage.
Building a car is a very complicated thing. From the perspective of the industry chain, the automobile industry chain is far more lengthy and cumbersome than the mobile phone industry chain. If you are impatient, you will not be able to eat hot tofu. First, focus on the software part you are best at and use it as a breakthrough. A good move.
Enemies are waiting around, it is not easy for Apple to grab the market for in-vehicle systems
At present, the in-vehicle system market is growing in parallel, and it has not yet formed a foregone conclusion.
From a cutting point of view, Apple CarPlay is somewhat similar to Huawei’s early in-car system HiCar.
In August 2019, Huawei officially released the HiCar in-vehicle system. Through the connection between the mobile phone and the car, based on three-layer standards and capabilities, it built a mobile phone and car mutual assistance resource pool, and further extended the mobile phone service scenario to the car. Tan Donghui, Vice President of Huawei Consumer Business Cloud Service, said, “We will focus on the usage scenarios and real needs of consumers, connect people-car-home scenarios, and create the ultimate end-to-end smart travel experience with ‘smart interconnection’. While enjoying richer mobile Internet services in the environment, there is no need to learn and adapt to new operation methods, and finally bring a super experience of superimposition of mobile phone + car and machine capabilities.”
In October 2020, Yu Chengdong, then the CEO of Huawei’s consumer business, disclosed for the first time that HiCar has cooperated with more than 20 car companies and more than 150 models.
HiCar is a test of the water before the Harmony OS smart cockpit is officially put on the car. At the 2020 China Auto Forum, Wang Jun, President of Huawei’s Smart Car Solutions BU, announced Huawei’s Hongmeng in-vehicle system: Hongmeng cockpit operating system HOS, intelligent driving operating system AOS, and intelligent vehicle control operating system VOS.
However, compared with Huawei Hongmeng in-vehicle system, the new generation of CarPlay is still based on mobile phone mapping. Through the software interface opened by car companies, it can realize the optimization of some basic function control and in-vehicle display effects. There is still a gap between the two. There is a fundamental difference.
The first is the integration of software and hardware. Huawei not only provides software services. For example, the system can simultaneously access the AI computing power of Huawei’s mobile phone chip NPU and the camera in the car to realize some computer vision applications that require neural network acceleration. For example, in communication , navigation, and voice interaction, the respective antennas, GPS modules, and pickup modules of the car and the mobile phone can work together to enhance the experience.
Secondly, in terms of cooperation, the cooperation between Apple CarPlay and car companies is mainly through software to provide users with an intelligent driving experience. The cooperation between Huawei and car companies is divided into three modes, namely, the provision of standardized components, the Hi mode, and the Huawei Smart Selection mode.
It is worth mentioning that it is not easy for Apple to open up the domestic car system market. The underlying operating system of CarPlay is iOS, but in 2021, the iOS system has encountered Waterloo in the Chinese market. According to statistics, the share of the iOS system in the Chinese market is only 16%, while the share of the Android system is as high as 84%. Since CarPlay only supports Apple device connections, CarPlay is largely limited by the number of users of its system.
Another analysis believes that it will be difficult for Apple to realize the large-scale application of the new generation of CarPlay in the future, mainly due to concerns about data security.
“It’s no longer the era of CarPlay alone. It may be difficult for Apple to stand out in the automotive field by relying on CarPlay alone. If Apple wants to increase its voice in the automotive field, vehicle manufacturing is inevitable.” The above car industry sources said.
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