Apple’s car will still be more about the electronics

For now, it's called 'Titan' but whatever the code word currently disguising its nature, the Apple Car could shake up the industry like few others.

For the past while, Apple has been luring car industry talent as it looks to build up a core of automobile expertise. Is Apple going to start competing with Ford? Or Mercedes? Or Tesla?

That seems rather unlikely. For all its abilities to branch out into new spheres (first computers, then music players, then phones, now watches) turning Apple from a maker of high-end electronics into a car maker would take quite some doing. Far more likely is that this is a reaction to the work done by arch-rival Google in the self-driving car sphere.

When the late Steve Jobs was still in charge of Apple, there was little doubting the sheer scale of the enmity between Apple and Google, and while that may hive dissipated a touch, the two great pillars of modern consumer electronics still watch and shadow each other closely.

Google’s efforts in the robotic car sphere have garnered it major headlines and technical plaudits. Apple will have taken note, and note also of the openings that providing such systems allows. Quite apart from the fact that BNP Paribas estimates that there is a potential USD$25-billion market for self-driving cars, Google is also looking at the potential for using its position as a supplier of the control systems as a bargaining chip for accessing car company customer databases. The more targeted ads it packages with its robot car setups, the more money Google stands to make. Apple, again, will be taking notes.

Currently, it's thought that Apple is working on an electric car that will demonstrate its self-driving car technology, and it's very probable that this concept will be designed by Mark Newson. The lauded designer joined Apple last year, and is seen as the heir apparent to Johnathan Ive – and he has motoring form in his book. Newson designed the Ford 021C concept car that was shown at the Tokyo motor show in 1999, and is reckoned to be one of the more influential concept cars of the past two decades. Certainly its understated surfaces still look fresh and its design language would sit happily alongside the iPad and iPhone.

Quite when all this will happen and when and if it will actually be something you can buy, that is open to pure speculation. Apple’s car programme was only established last year so while we may see some fruits of its work this year, a driveable, sellable car or system will be some long way off.

Then again, there is a tantalising possibility. The man who designed both Ayrton Senna's title-winning racing cars and the legendary McLaren F1 supercar could hold the keys to Apple's ambitions. Gordon Murray has turned away from V12-engined high-performance machines and instead put his admirable brain power to the task of reinventing how we design and build cars. His i-Stream system takes an enormous amount of investment, time and sheer physical bulk out of the requirements needed to establish a car factory and start turning out product.

Murray has previously said that of the several companies interested in licensing the technology for i-Stream, many were not currently actually part of the car industry. At the time, it was rumoured that both Sony and Apple were courting Murray – now that rumour could be coming to pass.