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  • - [Male Narrator] An unparalleled design,

  • long-lasting battery performance,

  • and an innovative autonomous system.

  • Introducing the Apple Car.

  • - [Female Narrator] Well, our version of the Apple Car

  • if a car could be made out of iPhone parts.

  • Apple's auto ambitions have been rumored for years,

  • and we still don't know if they'll come to fruition.

  • But what we do know is

  • that from self-driving capabilities

  • to running completely on battery power,

  • cars are becoming more and more like giant gadgets.

  • Even if you're not driving a Tesla or new electric vehicle,

  • there's a good chance your car is still powered

  • at least in part by a computer.

  • So what's next in the digital car revolution?

  • - Today, traditional auto companies

  • need to radically change how they do business.

  • It's very different when you look at

  • how an electric and autonomous car is built.

  • It is more like a computer on wheels.

  • - [Female Narrator] But what would it take

  • to make a car that's just as convenient

  • and well-integrated as an iPhone?

  • And what parts does Apple already

  • have experience engineering and producing?

  • To answer that, we had an idea:

  • crack open an iPhone and build a car

  • with the key automotive parts.

  • Tom Forsyth, a 3D artists from London,

  • was up to the challenge.

  • We shipped him a bunch of recycled iPhones and components,

  • he mocked up some ideas,

  • and we were cruising right along.

  • - I would thoroughly not recommend taking apart iPhones

  • unless you're a trained professional for it

  • because you may get cut,

  • you may set things on fire in a very dramatic way.

  • - [Female Narrator] Okay, so not everything

  • in here is made of iPhone parts.

  • The wheels, container for the seats,

  • and some other parts are 3D printed.

  • But most of it is iPhone.

  • And yes, this was made in London,

  • so the steering wheel is on the right side of the car.

  • - [Tom] We tried to use as many

  • of the iPhone parts as possible.

  • We used the entire back shell and all of the main components

  • of the iPhone 11 to be the kind of main undercarriage

  • and engine of the car, as it were.

  • - [Female Narrator] While Tom was building,

  • we spoke to experts about the technology that's going to be

  • core to the future of the car.

  • Here's what we put together.

  • One of the most important parts of this computer on wheels:

  • the battery and the infrastructure to charge it.

  • Apple knows a thing about batteries and chargers.

  • Okay, fine. The Apple Car won't be charged

  • via lightning port,

  • and hopefully Apple doesn't change the connector

  • every few years.

  • But Apple has spent decades improving

  • its battery performance in everything

  • from phones to laptops to watches.

  • But does that mean Apple could just scale up its batteries

  • and put them in a car?

  • We asked Jennifer Colgrove, an automotive analyst

  • who spends a lot of time talking

  • with battery and car companies.

  • - And each battery cell still the fundamentally

  • same chemistry as the cell you are using on your phone

  • or your laptop computer.

  • They are the fundamentally the same chemistry.

  • But however when you pack a lot of the batteries,

  • thousands of them, sometimes even like tens of thousands

  • of cells together into a EV battery.

  • So that is dramatic.

  • - [Female Narrator] Most EV batteries

  • are made of some combination of lithium ion and cobalt,

  • both high-demand materials Apple's familiar working with.

  • But to make car batteries

  • you'd need more land to build a factory,

  • more raw materials and a labor force that knows

  • how to build EV batteries.

  • Of course, Apple could outsource its battery production

  • much like it does now with its iPhone batteries.

  • But Apple is known for vertical integration,

  • controlling as much of the supply chain as possible

  • like with its chips and processors,

  • another core, pun intended,

  • element to the computerization of the car.

  • Apple has been making its own A series chips

  • for the iPhone, iPad and Apple watch for at least a decade.

  • And in 2020, Apple announced plans

  • to end its 15 year partnership with Intel

  • to start making its own very powerful chips

  • for its Mac computers.

  • - [Male Narrator] And we call it M1.

  • - [Female Narrator] These sorts of chips can be used in cars

  • in a number of different ways,

  • but they're specifically very important

  • to autonomous driving, explained Armando Periera.

  • He brings together tech and auto companies working

  • on self-driving cars.

  • - When we talk about computing, we're talking about

  • how can we squeeze all of these down

  • to a chip that is powerful enough

  • to run everything in parallel.

  • So you can not steer now and forget about the brakes

  • or engine control.

  • You have to do all of these things simultaneously.

  • - [Female Narrator] Chips that power everything

  • from collision warnings to touchscreens

  • and self-driving features are in such high demand

  • that car makers have had to suspend production

  • and furlough tens of thousands of workers

  • over recent shortages.

  • Apple's new chip production sets itself up

  • as a major player amongst industry giants

  • like Intel, Qualcomm and Nvidia.

  • - Of course, there's the chips that do the data processing,

  • but just having a chip in the car isn't enough.

  • There's actually a mass amount

  • of software that needs to be in place.

  • - [Female Narrator] Danny Shapiro leads marketing

  • for Nvidia's automotive business,

  • which makes chips and software to process data

  • for hundreds of car makers today,

  • including Mercedes-Benz, Toyota,

  • and Chinese EV makers Nio, XPeng and Li Auto.

  • - And so we've created a whole platform.

  • It's called Drive.

  • And that is the heart of the cars,

  • really the brain of the cars as well.

  • So everything plugs into this brain.

  • So you have cameras that are looking forward

  • or on the sides or in the back,

  • there's RADAR, there's LiDAR,

  • which is laser scanning.

  • So all different senses.

  • - [Female Narrator] Nvidia's autonomous drive platform

  • is a decade in the making.

  • And we don't know much about Apple's autonomous ambitions,

  • but CEO, Tim Cook, said they were working

  • on autonomous systems a few years ago.

  • - We're focusing on autonomous systems.

  • And clearly one purpose of autonomous systems

  • is self-driving cars.

  • There are others.

  • - [Female Narrator] A big part of autonomous

  • or self-driving technology relies on cameras,

  • RADAR and other sensors to analyze

  • what's going on around the car.

  • A lot of the self-driving cars in development

  • today use LiDAR, or Light Detection and Ranging technology.

  • It's like RADAR, but instead of using radio waves,

  • it measures distances using lasers.

  • Apple has LiDAR scanners or cameras built

  • into its iPad Pro and iPhone 12 Pro,

  • enabling augmented reality features

  • like seeing how furniture would look

  • in your room before buying it.

  • Put that technology on a car,

  • and you get a comprehensive look at the roads around you.

  • Building a car is in many ways more complicated

  • than building an iPhone.

  • So even if Apple has the component knowledge,

  • why would it even want to enter the auto industry?

  • We asked Gene Munster,

  • an analyst that's been covering Apple for years.

  • - We spend a lot of time in cars,

  • and Apple wants to create products

  • that their mission is products that enrich our lives,

  • and a big part of our time is spent moving around.

  • - [Female Narrator] Plus Apple has a history