It has emerged that Apple recently embarked on a secretive hiring spree where it promised the new employees that they would embark on the design and production of the company’s next big thing. According to some of these employees, the tech giant is on a mission to design a self-driving car that will be in the market in the coming few years. According to Apple, this is a product that is likely to take the market by a sweep and disrupt the car making industry. However, during an interview with the Bloomberg, the chief executive of the company Thomas D. Cook mentioned that the company had halted any automotive ambitions. Instead, he said that the company was embarking on other products that would make self-driving a reality. With regards to this, he mentioned that they were creating autonomous systems for self-driving cars. Apple already uses a self-driving shuttle in its premises to move its employees from one building to the other. However, there are suggestions that this kind of a shuttle will become commercial in the coming years. The New York Times discussed the company’s decision to abandon the project with five people who were familiar with the project before it stalled. This project has the code name Titan, and the five people only agreed to speak on an anonymity condition.
This has been the trend in Silicon Valley where technology companies are embarking on autonomous driving technology while staying clear of manufacturing cars. Another example is the Waymo which is a Google self-driving prototype. The new prototype by Apple according to the sources will be ferrying people from one office to the other. PAIL is the name of the new project that represents Palo Alto to Infinite Loop which happens to be the address of Apple’s main offices. The offices are located in Cupertino, California. Other than Apple, other companies that have embarked on a driverless car include Uber and Waymo. Back in 2014, Apple embarked on the Titan project that was graced by experienced Apple staff, new software engineers and engineers with years of experience in car making. Some of the features that the Titan project wanted to address include motorized doors that could open and close without noise, a car without pedals and steering as well as changing the interior displays of cars. From the approach, it was clear that Apple was focused on doing away with the awkward cone preferring a clean design.
