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In this week’s edition of his Power On newsletter, Bloomberg‘s Mark Gurman talks about how Apple and Tesla are a clear synergistic match on paper, but their products don’t integrate into each other as well as they theoretically should.
Gurman says Tesla and Apple should be working more closely (or at all) with each other to make interactions between their products flow better and provide more value to their mutual customers.
Both Tesla and Apple are at the forefront of their respective industries, have visionaries for leaders, and are developing ecosystems, not just products. However, the Tesla and Apple experiences don’t meld together as much as they should.
Tesla’s iPhone app is great to use as a key to your Tesla and executes remote control features just as well as the Tesla app for Android, but tailor-made compatibility between the two products seemingly comes to an end once you’re inside the vehicle.
Apple CarPlay (and Android Auto, for that matter) is infamously absent from Tesla’s in-car software, much to the disappointment of its consumers (many of whom are actually Apple employees, as Tesla EVs can be found in abundance at Apple’s office market lots). And that’s just the beginning of where Tesla and Apple should intersect better.
References to Apple Music support were found in Tesla’s car software late last year, but nothing ever came of it and the feature was seemingly nixed.
In addition to CarPlay and Apple Music support, there are other areas where the two companies could align. Tesla could choose to support Apple services like TV+ (Tesla already offers Netflix) and Apple Podcasts. Apple, on the other hand, could offer Tesla deeper integration with Apple Maps, better highlighting Tesla’s network of chargers.
Gurman admits that Apple’s plans to develop its own electric vehicle and its work on self-driving vehicle technology could be the bone of contention between the two companies preventing them from joining forces, but Apple is years away from its heavily rumored autonomous electric car.
Gurman goes on to say that Apple CEO Tim Cook and Tesla CEO Elon Musk have both admitted that they’ve never talked to each other, despite Musk attempting to sell Tesla to Apple in the past.
In a recent podcast, Cook expressed his “admiration and respect for the company [Musk has] built.” Tesla CEO Elon Musk, on the other hand, had some choice words for Apple during the former’s Q2 2021 earnings call.
