Apple purportedly crafted a robust chip, equivalent to four M2 Ultras combined, for its electric car endeavor. The development of this chip was nearly completed. However, Apple has officially terminated its decade-long, multi-billion-dollar electric car project.
Despite a decade of effort and billions of dollars invested, the electric car project “Titan” never materialized. The Cupertino tech giant abandoned its most ambitious project to date. Apple harbored lofty aspirations for its electric car, including an advanced fully autonomous driving system. To realize these ambitions, Apple purportedly developed a powerful chip equivalent to four M2 Ultras combined.
Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman stated that the Apple Silicon team played a “significant role” in the Apple Car project before its cancellation. He revealed that the company worked tirelessly to create the “AI brain” of the car, intended to be powered by a custom Apple Silicon chip.
Apple Car Power vs several automotive giants
If the project had come to fruition, it would have relied on a new chip equivalent to the power of four M2 Ultras, Apple’s most potent processor to date. Each M2 Ultra chip boasts up to 134 billion transistors, featuring a 24-core CPU, a 76-core GPU, and a specialized 32-core Neural Engine. Currently, only the latest Mac Studio and Mac Pro harness the power of the M2 Ultra.
What’s intriguing is that Apple had “nearly finished” developing this new chip before canceling the project. Following the project’s termination, Apple reassigned some engineers to its Generative AI team, suggesting that the new chip may be repurposed for future endeavors. However, Apple’s upcoming plans remain uncertain at present.
Apple’s car project has been in the works since 2014. Despite a decade of effort under Tim Cook’s leadership, the project failed to materialize. Throughout this period, the company explored various ideas and prototypes. Reports even indicated that Apple reached out to several automotive giants, including Tesla, Volkswagen, Mercedes-Benz, Ford, and McLaren, to collaborate on building a car.
Initially, Apple executives aimed to develop a fully autonomous car, facing numerous daunting challenges along the way. However, the company later opted to revive the project with a more cautious and less ambitious approach. Unfortunately, building a car didn’t align with Apple’s strengths. Despite exhausting all efforts, Apple ultimately abandoned its car ambitions after spending $1 billion annually.
The now-cancelled Project Titan represents a setback for Apple, which had hoped to diversify its revenue streams beyond iPhones and Macs. Many were eager to see what Apple could offer with its luxurious vehicle powered by a high-end Apple Silicon processor. Sadly, Apple’s futuristic vision for the automobile industry won’t come to fruition anytime soon.
