Earlier this month, we heard about Apple securing permission to test self-driving vehicles in California, confirming rumors that circulated for years about the company getting into the auto industry. Now, Bloomberg has visual evidence of its tech being tested in the real world.
Bloomberg noted that a Lexus RZ450h SUV rolled out of an Apple facility earlier this week, fitted with a bunch of what appear to be off-the-shelf sensors, as opposed to custom-built devices.
Here's the car that #Apple's using to test its autonomous car technology. Story with @mhbergen. https://t.co/jHLnJDRjoS pic.twitter.com/zTezUmcZwC
— Alex Webb (@atbwebb) April 27, 2017
For those keeping score, it’s the same model that Google used to test its own autonomous vehicle tech before the company spun off those efforts into a separate entity called Waymo.
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As is usually the case, Apple is keeping mum about its self-driving initiative, which is presently named Project Titan. But given that on-road tests are essential to this technology, it’s likely that we’ll see more of the company’s work in progress over the coming months.
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