• by Laurie Sullivan  @lauriesullivan, February 28, 2024

Two Apple executives told employees Tuesday the EV project they had been working on for years will wind down.

Many of the 2,000 employees previously on the car team known as the Special Projects Group will shift to the artificial intelligence (AI) division under executive John Giannandrea. Those employees will focus on generative AI projects as the company’s priorities shift.

The decision to wind down the project ends a multibillion-dollar effort called Project Titan, according to Bloomberg, which reportedly had started working on a car around 2014. The autonomous electric vehicle with a limousine-like interior would have included voice-guided navigation.

The move toward AI could also help the company focus more on its search projects.

Analyst firm Bard Equity Research earlier this month in a note reminded investors not to “count out Apple, which we think is also gearing up a potential launch in Search.”

Apple may have given up billions in potential revenue, reported Bloomberg, but it also had many AI challenges. Apple had attempted to build a powerful energy-efficient AI system in the car -- enough to make a it fully autonomous.

The company does plan to reveal new AI capabilities such as automated tools for software development and features for summarizing news articles at its developers conference in June.

The first new features are reportedly planned for iOS 18 and scheduled for release around September. 

As of the end of 2022, Apple had planned to release a model by 2026 with advanced self-driving features.

In January, Apple pushed its plans back to 2028, according to Bloomberg. The selling price had been reduced to $100,000 from $120,000.

“Apple had such an aura of being able to create really innovative, easy-to-use stuff,” said Phil Abram, a former General Motors executive who ran the company’s infotainment division before retiring in 2017 told The Wall Street Journal. “There was a view that if they ever did put out a car, that would be tough to compete with.”