The million-dollar question for Apple is: What will be the next big thing? One thing is certain: it’s not cars. In February, the iPhone company finally ended “Project Titan” and it has now been announced that several hundred employees from the department have been laid off. But not all of them, and there is a good reason for that. Apple, the usually well-informed Mark Gurman reports for the Bloomberg news service, is working on robotics technologies.
This may seem like a strange pivot, but it isn’t, for two reasons. On the one hand, Apple has been pursuing such plans for a long time. On the other hand, many technologies that Apple engineers researched and developed from the car project can also be used for robots. After all, the main goal of “Titan” was to build a completely autonomous car.
The craziest robot idea is probably to develop a kind of automated household helper. Someone who moves around the house autonomously and has so much sensitivity that you can even let her do the dishes. However, it is clear to everyone involved that this is a challenge that cannot be achieved with the currently available technologies.
However, Gurman reports, Apple has given its management the route that the future of the company revolves around three areas: cars, mixed reality and the smart home. However, that was before the car project ended. And so the pressure is growing on Apple to become less dependent on the iPhone, with which the company still generates just over half of its sales. After a fairly long birth, the Apple Vision Pro mixed reality glasses were introduced. With a price of 3,500 dollars, it is not a mass-produced product, and there are still too few applications for it that make it indispensable. That leaves the robots.
When it comes to new products, Apple is traditionally very secretive
Apple’s robotics efforts will therefore be directed at least in part towards products that are brought to market more quickly and possibly with less development work. Gurman reports on a robot-like product that can move its screen. This was intended to imitate human-like movements such as nodding the head. However, the Apple specialist continued, Apple is not sure whether the project should be pursued further.
In general, Apple maintains strict secrecy about new product ideas. Usually something only comes to light when the product is ready for the market – or when, like the car project, it is scrapped. Apple has reportedly put together a super-secret team to develop robots. We are still looking for people for this. In job advertisements, the company is looking for “innovative and passionate experts in machine learning and robotics to shape the artificial intelligence that powers the next generation of Apple products.”
One thing is certain: If there ever is an Apple robot, it probably won’t be called iRobot – the name has already been given to a vacuum cleaner manufacturer.