I mean how much of a return can carplay generate on an initial investment of 8 billion and on-going OPEX even if selling to all the manufacturers (which it isn't).
I think the point is that it was unlikely their intention to be building solely for carplay and an actual car was a bonus. However if they wind down the hardware play of an actual car this could be something that soften those sunk costs.
3. Selling other things to people who bought one of your things.
4. Preventing people who are subscribing to your thing from switching to somebody else's thing.
5. Preventing your competition from commoditizing things and driving prices down.
(There aren't really just five, there is no one "theory of everything," it's just a literary device.)
CarPlay is obviously #1 "Selling a thing," manufacturers license it. But it could also be #4 "Preventing people who are subscribing to your thing from switching to somebody else's thing."
If automobiles all have their own proprietary interfaces or worse, Android Auto, people who drive cars may end up buying phones that integrate nicely with their cars and ditching their iPhones.
If my conjecture is correct, Apple is investing in CarPlay to protect the most profitable product the world has ever seen.
>But [CarPlay] could also be #4 "Preventing people who are subscribing to your thing from switching to somebody else's thing."
The more reasons an existing user has to value something they already use, the harder it becomes for the user to switch. With few points of stickiness, it's easy for a user to check if an alternative has, say, similarities to features A and B. But if it's ABCDEFGHIJK, the likelihood of that user leaving drops dramatically. It's a common point that Apple does well iterating on its products, but that iteration goes beyond performance and capabilities into areas of stickiness.
Imagine a world where the car manufacturers no longer deal with software development for the vehicle, but instead you have a licensing agreement with Apple where CarPlay is the interface. Similar to Volvo and Google and Android Automotive. A lot of car manufacturers are standardizing around Android in general (see Acura, Volvo, BMW). If Apple could get in with an A-series chip and a custom software stack, then that would probably be a decent amount of money through some hardware purchasing and software licensing. Look at how Cariad (the VAG stack) blew up schedules for upcoming Porsche and Audi models and early versions of it were laggy, missing features, OTA updates are slow/non-existant, etc. If Apple can get their foot in the door, it opens up new service opportunities for things like Apple Music alongside any licensing, which may be the bigger goal.
Given the thread on Volvo and polestar bemoaning all the issues with the new Android Auto versions, I’m not so eager to continue in that trend. Let the car companies do what they do best. Build an automotive grade car that does the car thing really well and leave the entertainment to the CarPlay. Getting hud and center driver console display driven by CarPlay would be awesome though.
This next generation of CarPlay is the ultimate iPhone experience for the car. It provides content for all the driver’s screens including the instrument cluster, ensuring a cohesive design experience that is the very best of your car and your iPhone. Vehicle functions like radio and temperature controls are handled right from CarPlay. And personalization options ranging from widgets to selecting curated gauge cluster designs make it unique to the driver.
