Apple is reportedly ramping up its development of an electric car, having labelled it a “committed project” and prepared to triple the size of the project team for an intended launch in 2019.
This news comes from The Wall Street Journal, which reports that leaders of Project Titan, as the project is codenamed, have been given the go-ahead to significantly increase the number of people working on the car from 600 to 1800. This is seemingly to help Apple towards its target of starting to ship the car in 2019.
If this launch time seems ambitious, it should be considered that, according to the Journal‘s sources, the first electric cars released by Apple will not be self-driving – contrary to what earlier reports might have suggested. This functionality could instead be saved for later Apple cars.
The Journal has also suggested that 2019 could be the target year for simply confirming the car’s main features, rather than initial shipping – and that “people familiar with the project” doubt that Apple will actually meet its 2019 target.
Last week, we reported evidence that Apple could partner with BMW for manufacture of the car. Indeed, whenever the first Apple car does arrive, we wouldn’t be surprised to see it offer feature-rich integration with the iPhone and Apple Watch – like the BMW i3, pictured above.
