Rumors about an Apple car being in development just won’t go away. One of the latest reports indicated that BMW executives have been talking with Apple about the possibility of working together on a car. However, BMW denies that report, which was in German magazine Auto Motor und Sport.
Apple, BMW talks not about cars
Reuters reports (via CNBC) that the German magazine cited a “high ranking BMW manager” who said Apple was impressed with the carbon fiber technology they use for their electric cars. Of course just being impressed with a particular technology is a far cry from actually talking about partnering to build a car.
A spokesperson for BMW reportedly said that they regularly speak with IT and telecommunications companies, including Apple. The spokesperson said topics like connected vehicles are the focus of these talks and not building a car together.
Will Apple make BMW’s operating system?
According to Auto Motor und Sport, one of the issues in the supposed talks between BMW and Apple was whether the former would allow the latter to create an operating system for the i3 electric car. In order to do that, the German automaker would have to share details about its software with Apple, which it may not be willing to do.
The BMW spokesperson noticeably did not mention this issue. In fact, if the automaker has been speaking with Apple about connected cars, it would make sense that Apple would be interested in putting its own operating system inside BMW’s cars. If the company is able to strike a deal with BMW, then it would push Apple’s connected vehicle efforts beyond CarPlay and deeper into the auto industry—without the company having to build its own car to do it.
It seems like this sort of strategy would be more up Apple’s alley than building its own car. Apple tends to prefer high margin products, and cars certainly are not. Even if the company is building a car for testing purposes, it still seems unlikely that an Apple car will ever hit the streets. Putting an operating system inside already-established automakers certainly sounds like something that would bring high margins for Apple.
As of this writing, shares of Apple were down by 0.98% to $127.28 per share.
