Let the Apple Car rumors roll on. Apple has been granted a patent (number 10,895,866) for “position error correction” for electric motorswhich could, but not necessarily, apply to an electric vehicle.
Here’s the summary of the patent filing: “Position and speed correction are applied to observed values from a position sensor in order to operate an electric motor. Observed position values and observed speed values are obtained from the position sensor for time points during a sampling window, ideal position values and ideal speed values are determined for each of the time points, and position and speed error values are determined based on the observed and ideal values.
“Stored position information is updated using the position error values and the speed error values. The electric motor is operated using corrected position values and corrected speed values that are determined from the observed position values, the observed speed values, and the stored position information.”
On January 10, it was announced (rumored?) that Apple and Hyundai plan to sign a partnership deal on autonomous electric cars by March and start production around 2024 in the U.S.
On January 8, Korea IT News reported that Apple and Hyundai would team up to produce electric vehicles. Hyundai is a South Korean multinational automotive manufacturer headquartered in Seoul. Hyundai Motor Company was founded in 1967 and, along with its 32.8% owned subsidiary, Kia Motors, and its 100% owned luxury subsidiary, Genesis Motor, and electric vehicle subsidiary, Ioniq.
However, as noted by iMore on Jan. 19, Korea’s eDaily claims that Hyundai intends to transition the company’s “Apple Car” partnership to its Kia brand as part of an arrangement that could see production move to the U.S.
The report adds that Hyundai has decided it’s “not suitable” for the Apple Car business because of its will, to continue the Hyundai brand. Plus, the car maker purportedly doesn’t want to come an original equipment manufacturer for Apple vehicles.
A January 7 report from Bloomberg says Apple will take at least half a decade to launch an autonomous, electric vehicle because development work is still at an early stage. Quoting unnamed “people with knowledge of the efforts,” the article says the tech giant has a small team of hardware engineers developing drive systems, vehicle interior and external car body designs with the goal of eventually shipping a vehicle.
Bloomberg says this is “a more ambitious goal than in previous years when the project mostly focused on creating an underlying self-driving system.” The article adds that Apple has also added more ex-Tesla Inc. executives to the project.
The accompanying image is courtesy of The Detroit Bureau.
