While the likes of Meta, Boston Dynamics, Tesla, and many others are chasing commercial humanoid robots, Apple isn’t quite there yet. It does, however, have other robotic ambitions. According to a report from The Information, the Fruit Company is working on a larger, robotic version of the newly released HomeView.
The ‘why’ is probably a question for the marketing department. For now, Apple is focused on building the thing, which will likely be called the HomeView ‘Ultra’ or HomeView ‘Max’ — though even those aren’t set in stone.
Apple’s robotic ambitions come with a twist
The HomeView, if you haven’t been keeping up, is a R6,300 home hub fitted with a 7in Liquid Retina display. It’s designed to control your smart home from a single interface and handle media requests. Siri AI is built in, of course. The Ultra or Max would reportedly bump that up to a 9in display and stick it on a swivelling arm.
In theory, the device would be smart enough to swivel in any direction to face whoever is speaking to it. It’s fitted with a bunch of cameras and sensors that would let the ‘bot act autonomously and do things like turn on the light when someone walks into the room, or tell the cat to get off the table. This aligns with what Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman said of the device, which has reportedly been ready to go for about two years.
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The report cites “internal disagreements” at Apple over which features should be used in the first-gen device or saved for a follow-up, which is also being discussed. It’s no surprise that the ‘Ultra’ or ‘Max’ version has been waiting in the wings for this long. Apple repeatedly delayed the release of the HomeView ’til its AI had caught up.
Don’t expect the HomeView Ultra (or whatever it’s called) to arrive anytime soon. The device — which apparently resembles an old iMac G4 or Pixar’s lamp mascot — is targeting a 2027 release. Even that isn’t guaranteed, with the larger model possibly being saved until 2028. When it does reach the market, Apple will try its luck with a price of around R16,500 ($1,000). That… seems like a hard sell, even by Apple’s standards.
