The ultimate objective of Apple's Car Project has shifted toward autonomous, unmanned driving, under the new leadership of Bob Mansfield. Its previous goal was to be just a manned vehicle, like many others.
Mansfield is one of Apple's hardware engineers, and the former Senior Vice President of Technologies, before abandoning the position to focus on future autonomous technology. The mobile phone manufacturer will be focusing on creating an autonomous vehicle and, in the future, to get into partnership with a car manufacturing company, according to a report by Bloomberg.
Apple's approach involves two main development facets: the hardware of the vehicle itself, and the software needed to make it autonomous. Apple is well known for this kind of development process in their computers and phones, where the operating system (iOS and Macintosh) is developed specifically to be incorporated to the hardware of the smart phone and the computer , making it exceptionally quick and flexible.
In an interesting note, Apple has hired Dan Dodge, according to Mac Rumors. Dodge was the forerunner of BlackBerry's automotive software division.
He spearheaded the development of QNX, which is a software available in many vehicle systems. Dodge is under the supervision of Mansfield, who ultimately reports to Apple CEO Tim Cook.
In addition to Apple's request of assistance from one of BlackBerry's technical managers, Mansfield has divided the people involved in the project into three teams: one for the sensor, another for the software, and the last group for the hardware engineering. They have also hired former Ford employees who had experience in car manufacturing.
The previous head of the Car Project, Steve Zadesky, was rumored to have caused delays because of erroneous time management and organizational shifts. The most recent rumor regarding Apple's launch of the Apple Car is in the year 2021.
If the case is that Apple would decide not to start from scratch by excluding the hardware, and to mainly focus on the software product instead, and incorporate it into already existing vehicles, it might push the release much sooner. So far, all that is know is that the project is back on track with a more reliable head to lead the development. Below is a video with additional details regarding what Elon Musk thinks of Apple's secret car project.