Apple’s electric car could come as early as 2025, Bloomberg reports

The story of Apple and its ambition to develop its own electric cars is never going away. Early this year, Hyundai said it was in early talks with Apple to develop self-driving electric vehicles and batteries, according to a report from local media in South Korea. After many years of speculations, it now appears that Apple’s electric car may come sooner than most people expect.

Apple is pushing to launch its own electric car as early as 2025 and the iPhone giant is also refocusing the project around full self-driving capabilities, according to a Thursday report from Bloomberg News, citing people familiar with the matter.

As we reported in January, which is also confirmed by the latest report from Bloomberg, the first Apple Car will be 100 percent autonomous and will not require a driver. “Apple’s ideal car would have no steering wheel and pedals, with interiors designed around hands-off driving,” the report said.

Another report from CNBC confirmed an earlier rumor that Apple is negotiating with Hyundai-Kia a $3.6 billion deal that would allow it to mass-produce the Apple Car in the US and have full control over the hardware and software. Kia would use the investment to build a dedicated assembly line for the Apple Car, which could mass-produce anywhere from 100,000 to 400,000 units of self-driving electric cars per year.

Apple’s automotive effort, known as Project Titan, has been going since 2014 when it first started to design a vehicle from scratch. The popularity of Elon Musk with over 60 million fans on Twitter, has led to growing demands for electric cars. Concerns about climate change have also led to customers in European countries switching to eco-friendly cars like electric cars and hydrogen-powered fuel-cell cars.

“It’s a matter of when, not if,” Wedbush analyst Dan Ives said, adding that chances of Apple unveiling its own standalone car by 2025 as 60% to 65%.

Bloomberg also noted that Apple is accelerating the work on its electric car project and aiming to have the car ready by 2025. However, the report said some people working on the project were skeptical about the timeline even with recent progress, which includes the car’s underlying self-driving system, processor chips, and advanced sensors. Apple declined to comment on the report.

Below is Bloomberg Scoop video discussing the new Apple Electric Car.