Apple Reportedly Looking To Reinvent The Supply Chain Of Automobiles 

Apple is run by a supply chain genius in Tim Cook. When Cook arrived at Apple in 1998, he applied the legendary "just in time" manufacturing techniques that had made automakers the biggies of the previous century to reinvent how Apple made its gadgets. Even his right-hand man, chief operating officer, Jeff Williams is known to be something of a supply chain wizard, a spitting image of his boss in more ways than one. So it is quite logical, that Cook and company would want to do the same with the Apple Car. Now the Apple Car project has been in the works for half a decade now with it stopping and starting. In recent months, there has been plenty of activity around the car and many believe in the next 3-4 years it could be reality. To achieve this Apple is apparently looking into every detail of the supply chain as per a WSJ report. 

Apple's CEO Tim Cook is often credited as being a supply chain wizard 

"We have seen enough echoes in the supply chain that we know Apple is really looking into every detail of car engineering and car manufacturing. But nobody knows if what Apple creates will be a car or a tech platform or a mobility service," said Peter Fintl, the director of technology and innovation at Capgemini Engineering Germany. 

Apple is developing an advanced EV powertrain and has also been working on autonomous technology, though its tech is deemed to be behind what Waymo and Tesla have achieved. Apple could be planning a service of robotaxis perhaps. 

The iPhone maker is looking for its next unicorn which has eluded it since the launch of the storied smartphone 

So sometimes Apple re-focussed its energies towards just making core self-driving technology, but in the recent past, it has gone back to the plan of making full Apple-branded cars. It has, however, run into resistance from auto manufactures who don't want to just "make" a car as per Apple's specifications with it being marketed as an Apple product, a technique it deploys across all its products which are manufactured by biggies like Foxconn and Pegatron. 

The Apple Car division in the recent past has been led by John Giannandrea who is the AI and machine learning boss at the Cupertino-based company. Giannandrea previously was the head of Google Search, before he joined Apple in 2018.