Apple is reportedly developing its own production of electric cars by 2024, as per Reuters.
The American tech giant is in the process of developing self-driving cars utilizing the company’s own “breakthrough battery technology,” which can “radically” lower the cost of batteries while at the same time increasing the vehicle’s range.
Project Titan (the name of this project) was launched back in 2014, but its progress has been turbulent over the years, at one point shifting focus to software instead after reassessing its goals, before Apple veteran Doug Field returned from Tesla to oversee the project and laid off a staggering 190 people from the team.
Tesla‘s CEO Elon Musk chimed in on Twitter soon after the news surfaced, revealing that he once tried to reach out to Tim Cook to discuss a possible acquisition of Tesla for a price worth just 1/10th of its current valuation, to which Cook said no. Musk also called the accuracy of Reuters‘ report in question, especially in regards to the “breakthrough battery technology,” saying that his own company has already been using iron-phosphate batteries in its vehicles and that “mono cell” designs are “electrochemically impossible.”
Strange, if true.
– Tesla already uses iron-phosphate for medium range cars made in our Shanghai factory.
– A monocell is electrochemically impossible, as max voltage is ~100X too low. Maybe they meant cells bonded together, like our structural battery pack?
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 22, 2020
