Apple’s rumored electric car may use eye-tracking technology, including an automotive-grade processor insiders are calling the “C1 Chip.” Photo: Apple
The electric vehicle (EV) world is going nuts the past several months over rumors of an electric Apple car. And now, a convincing, albeit highly-speculative, new report has many wondering if the car will include some seriously impressive new technology.
According to a recent report from EE Times, some are speculating that the rumored Apple Car may include eye-tracking technology, using what industry insiders are calling a “C1 Chip” as its processor (via MacRumors). The C1 chip could be based on an A12 Bionic processor, and could even have in-cabin AI abilities, according to the report.
#AppleCar is going to release its electrical vehicle in this decade are we going to see #teslaphone soon.@elonmusk
— SpaceTime (@omvratsharma) January 9, 2021
Tesla’s current Full Self-Driving (FSD) chip has a power consumption of 36W, compared to the A12 Bionic processor’s power consumption of just 3.5W. The FSD chip includes 6 billion transistors, while the A12 has up to 6.9 billion – and this will be old technology by the time Apple releases its electric car, so it’s tough to say what they’ll really unveil when the time comes.
But even with its old tech, Apple’s chip shows some pretty significant improvements in power consumption over what Tesla has on the market.
Apple has also previously licensed certain technologies from other companies for its hardware, including Seeing Machines, which is dedicated to creating processors that track optical pathways. This could have major implications for future driver assistance and autonomous technologies, and could even be a game-changer for the whole industry.
Still, Apple will need to do a lot to create an automotive-grade processor, and it is difficult to say what it will come up with. In any case, the company isn’t going to do anything less than spectacular, but all eyes are on the iPhone maker to see if it can replicate success to yet another industry.
