Every Car Is an Apple Car
The tech giant is reportedly scratching its decade-long plan to build an EV. It upended the auto industry anyways. Illustration by The Atlantic February 27, 2024, 7:01 PM ET Apple has long been a company shrouded in mystery—and perhaps its most mysterious recent project of all has been the Apple Car. For a decade, reports have continually emerged about the company building its own electric, autonomous car as smart and beautiful as an iPhone. The company never even confirmed the project’s existence, even as it hired executives from Lamborghini and BMW. MotorTrend created a speculative Apple Car in 2016, treating it like an object of science fiction, then another in 2022. But as of this afternoon, that dream appears dead. Apple is scrapping its electric-car effort and pivoting to generative AI, according to a new report from Bloomberg, in one of the biggest failed endeavors in the tech titan’s history. Apple did not immediately respond to a request for comment, but the abandonment, if confirmed, will breed plenty of schadenfreude: billions spent with little to …