Making a car is way more difficult than making a smartphone. And the tech tycoons have realized it

They have succeeded in their venture of making smartphones. The tech giants of Silicon Valley have made smartphone an indispensible necessity for each individual across the world. That certainly calls for an appreciation. And now they are headed to bring the next frontier of innovation – automobile.

No doubt, cars are a lot harder to make than smartphones. It not only involves massive costs to erect auto plants, complexities in developing new sales and service systems, but daunting liabilities involved when human lives are at stake. The recent incident of Volkswagen itself is an eye-opener.

As per a news report by Associated Press, car manufacturers across the globe recalled a record 64 million vehicles in 2014, thanks to some minimal flaw in the making.

General Motors has had to pay $5.3 billion to cover fines, victim compensation and the recall of millions of vehicles for faulty ignition switches. Toyota paid a $1.2 billion fine for failing to report safety defects, and Volkswagen has set aside $7.3 billion for the potential costs of its emissions scandal, the AP news report says.

And as smart cars are gradually trying to redefine driving, Google and Apple have already spent $270 billion in the fray.
These challenges of the car industry are making them rethink on automotive technology now.

GOOGLE
Google’s holding company Alphabet at California spent six years working on cars that can drive without human assistance. But now the company plans to make the self-driving system available to automakers that already have factories, dealerships and experience.

"We have enormous respect for the expertise of the automotive industry and how big and complex a job it is to manufacture a vehicle," company spokeswoman Courtney Hohne told AP. "We'll partner with many different companies to bring this technology into the world safely."

Just like many smartohones are powered by Android, Google can make a self-driving system makes it to market, the company could license the software for a fee.

APPLE
Apple CEO Tim Cook hasn’t commented anything on smart cars yet. However, Apple has developed software for automakers called CarPlay, which lets drivers use an iPhone and its voice-activated assistant Siri to operate some electronic controls and entertainment systems.

The AP news report confirmed, Apple has reported $39.5 billion in net income for its last fiscal year, on total sales of $182.8 billion. Apple outsources manufacturing to contractors in Asia. That may be more difficult to do with cars.

Making an iPhone is complex, with about 1,700 components in an iPhone 6 Plus, but it pales in comparison to a vehicle, which has some 10,000 parts.

UBER
While a lot of prospects are cooking inside this fastest growing strart up in the Silicon Valley, Uber CEO Travis Kalanick has suggested that the cab aggregator service could someday expand with the help of self-driving vehicles, and touted the technology's promise for improving safety and easing traffic congestion.

(Image: Wiki)