Apple revives automotive ambitions with Ford deal for in-car software

Apple is making a fresh bid for the automotive market, offering carmakers including Ford new technology for their navigation and assisted-driving systems, two years after ending its own efforts to build an electric vehicle.

The iPhone maker said on Thursday that Ford would be the first carmaker to adopt its new MapKit for automotive software development kit, which will be built into dashboards of Ford’s forthcoming electric vehicle platform. It will also provide road data to the US manufacturer’s BlueCruise hands-free driving system.

Apple has offered its infotainment system, CarPlay, to automakers for many years. But the new software integrates Apple more deeply into vehicles than before.

Tim Cook, Apple’s outgoing chief executive, has long harboured ambitions to push the company deeper into the automotive market. It spent billions of dollars over more than a decade on Project Titan, a secretive effort to build an EV that was ultimately abandoned in 2024.

At that time, Apple was under pressure to catch up in generative AI. This year it unveiled an upgraded Siri virtual assistant, set to launch in September.

However, some of the autonomous systems and AI technology that were developed as part of Project Titan live on in Apple’s products today, including its own chips that help accelerate AI tasks.

“With our new MapKit for Automotive SDK, we’re bringing Maps further into drivers’ daily lives,” said Eddy Cue, Apple’s senior vice-president of services and health.

Jim Farley, Ford chief executive, called the Apple deal one of the company’s “most important announcements”. He added: “Apple Maps has delivered a world-class product, and we’re honoured to be among the first to embed it directly into a vehicle, helping define intuitive, capable driving.”

The New York Times first reported the tie-up.

Detailed data about cities and highways is a vital ingredient in developing self-driving cars. Apple is one of the few companies that has built extensive mapping data co…