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apple is scraping its multi-billion dollar plan to release an electric vehicle a not so secret project that was
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in the works for almost a decade the company told employees in internal meeting this week that the plan notice
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project Titan has been canceled surprising the 2,000 person team had been working on it according to reports
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many of those employees will now be reassigned to Apple's generative AI projects um which will be interesting to
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see because they have a lot less data than other people because they don't collect it um you were excited about the
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idea of an Apple car Scott um I'm I'm surprised they canceled it I maybe they're working on software Apple's car
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was initially envisioned as an EV to compete against Tesla and later a self-driving car rival wh which is comes
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from uh Google The Google folks Elon mus rejected reacted to Apple's news on X posting a saluting emoji and a cigarette
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I don't whatever [ __ ] you um what do you think first of all do you consider it a
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failure or they smart to get out of the EV game um even though they never said they were doing it so look a a a
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strategy in a vision is meant to be unifying but not a suicide pact and you were right two years ago I predicted
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they were going to build the most valuable waiting list in history that this made a ton of sense and in order to
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move the needle on what was then a $1.6 trillion do market cap company they would need to go after big game and the
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automobile industry was big I felt that Tesla had unearned market cap at 700 billion or whatever it was then and that
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Apple was just salivating to go after some of that but here's the thing when the data changes as a good manager you
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have the right and the obligation to change your mind and a step back from the wrong direction is a step in the
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right direction and you know what Cara this was absolutely the right decision because in the last 12 months the
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atmospherics have changed dramatically and let's just talk about some of those the EV Market is plateauing if not
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slowing all the projections are way overestimated consumers pivot to EVS Toyota's looking like like a genius
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right now CU they did not go all in on E hybrid which popular that's right they went hybrids Tesla is running up against
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margin compression and then you have um you have the company which is probably um probably the most important company
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that no one talks about byd is now outselling Tesla so Apple Warren Buffett has a big stake in that is that right I
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didn't know that yeah but let's look at the market versus where it was say just even two years ago much less when this
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project was probably approved you have a low margin Capital intensive product that is subsidized basically every car
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company in the world has either gotten Federal loans Tesla or has been bailed out GM and Chrysler it's a massively
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subsidized industry which makes it incredibly economically inefficient they have this enormous competitor with a
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$600 billion market capitalization that is doing really well called Tesla they have another gigantic lowcost
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competitor that's actually out selling Tesla right now and the consumer seems to be pulling back from EVs and EV the
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prices of used EVS are plummeting and they look at this in in addition what has popped up generative Ai and so the
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the key to strategy is strategy is decisions that attempt to cut a swath between market dynamics and your
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internal competences in order to add shareholder value and the key to strategy is not what you
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say yes to but what you say no to and even Apple has finite resources both human and capital and my guess is
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they've said based on this Market which quite frankly looks increasingly difficult we would rather take I farite
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resources all right I'm gonna let me let me give you some thoughts on this okay I
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think EVS yes they have I think they over everyone over invested right and so I I still think it's the direction it's
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going period I think this is the way it's going I just think consumers aren't quite ready yet um it's sort of the
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Valley of Death area that happens in but a lot of what who got into this car makers right car makers got into this
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and started to make are starting to make beautiful cars now as they do that I do
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think customers and people have you know have don't have worries about charging and everything else I do think it's
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going to move you're going to see in 10 years you know I forget how much of a percentage EVS are it'll it'll it'll
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move up it just won't move up this quickly that's one CU I cuz I do think this is the way things are going these
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these autonomous vehicles not excuse me electric vehicles and then eventually autonomous vehicles I think that is the
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direction I think SC science fiction has been correct about this that we will have autonomous electric cars and you
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know in the future when we're dead when both of us are dead um so I think that's
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it's just there's so many competitors now and now you do have like byd um and and which is just roasting everybody
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else and they're and they're coming here they're looking at Mexican uh sites to build a factory so that they can move
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into this area um so I do think people will have a lot more Choice like they do with regular cars that's one and so but
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it's a lot less than the investment so GM everybody's pulled back but they haven't totally pulled back because they
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realize this is the future the second thing is um Apple I was always dubious as you know about them building the car
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I'm like why don't they just work on the software for the car like making the car
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these electric cars work better or he you know uh cook Tim Cook never acknowledged this car project and
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referred to it uh as work on autonomous systems I think they should not abandon I think they should abandon building the
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car that was sort of weird to me but um but keep at this idea of how to operate Transportation Vehicles right it's a
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great area and as to AI I think it's very important that they incorporate AI into all their products so that you you
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like assistance all that kind ofu stuff like I don't they're going to have a harder time in the a market because they
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don't collect as much data um but it's a better bet for them to focus on making these products seamless in a new AI
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environment like my AI my Apple AI talks to your Apple AI kind of things um and I
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think that's where they're going to get the big push of keeping you in the Apple
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ecosystem I'm not sure you know what I think was likely the final nail in the coffin when they said okay it's time to
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officially announce this is over is rivan the guy left oh yeah if why is that well okay rivan's been around a
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decade and a half it's executed really well I have an order on it rivan real briefly I'm going to get uh that ocean
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foam green rivan I've already outfitted it oh cool and I bought a home in Aspen and I'm going to drive into town have
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lunch at casu a dinner Cash Cash I'm going to be a cliche of a douchebag and everyone is going to love me and I'm
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going to put my dogs in the back of the rivan anyways I love rivan I think they're beautiful they're really popular
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they have executed really well they cost about $70,000 this is an incredibly difficult business and they probably
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they probably said what's the analog here and they're like well the analog's Tesla and I was like come on Tesla
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caught got in front of a tsunami when the entire industry didn't want to acknowledge what was happening they had
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a spokesperson that brought massive attention to it government subsidies what has happened there is a unicorn on
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top of a unicorn that gives birth to unicorns right they said the the analog to what we're trying to do here is rivan
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rivan is exec well it's a good looking car well interesting one of the signs of this was and I remember paying a lot of
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attention this guy named DJ I think it's novotney he was sort of one of the early
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car people at Apple he left to go which I think I saw him at the music Miami Music Festival he's right there with
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Calvin I I like I like Rufus dool and Calvin harrism more but he's right up there I'm sorry go ahead anyway he went
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to rivan and now he went to rivan and that was a big deal now as to rivan it's it's interesting one of the people who
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follows Apple Gene monsters said Apple should buy revamp like that's how to do it like don't get out but actually buy
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it it's actually a really interesting that's a really interesting idea do you like that that's Jean moner who said
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that um just buying losses at this point I'm sorry go ahead car yeah but gets them in there I don't know it was that
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was the the alternative I guess it's a it's a huge project and they really are focused in on um they should be focused
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in properly on integrating AI into their systems and also um on on their spatial
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Computing they've got to they got to be focused on that more than this but buying ribbean could be something I
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don't know could be interesting yes so he said Apple's a tech company and tech companies by definition need to grow and
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that's the $400 billion question that they have here they've got all this money um so they he he feels like to
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grow the business you got to get into they shouldn't uh because he thinks Apple Vision Pro has potential but the
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car they would grow he thinks it eventually would grow was an interesting you know he thinks they need to be in a
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New Market and that why abandon it stay in stay in this market by buying someone
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that's not an apple thing to do they're not acquires um it's an interesting idea
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but rivan would have to get their financial house in order it's tough to buy a company that's losing that kind of
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money right now yeah but they'd get a great great stat that that guy who's the CEO of rivan's impressive it's a really
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interesting idea if they could get sort of to uh or close to break even then I think it'd be a great idea for Apple but
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as you said Apple doesn't like to make Acquisitions doesn't like to do it they don't like they do it but what's the
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last one the headphones what did they buy last I can't even remember beets didn't they buy beets beets yeah they we
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had them on stage one that was a long freaking time ago anyway um it's not like them to do that but they could
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be