• For years, Apple followers have claimed a connection between the tech large and Route 14 Funding Companions primarily based on skinny proof.
• We visited Route 14’s Arizona proving floor and noticed a automotive with a sensor stack with a design like one Apple has been testing.
• We additionally uncovered paperwork that seems to attach not less than one particular person to each corporations.

In late 2005, DaimlerChrysler bought its proving floor in Wittmann, Arizona, to homebuilder Toll Brothers and its companions for $312 million. The brand new homeowners supposed to make use of the 5500-acre property to develop a deliberate neighborhood with about 33,000 houses. It by no means materialized, and in 2010, the builders defaulted on their mortgage, leaving the proving floor within the possession of the undertaking’s lender, iStar.

After greater than a decade of possession, the industrial real-estate finance firm lastly unloaded the land, promoting it to Route 14 Funding Companions LLC in July 2021 for $125 million. Route 14 Funding Companions was no stranger to the property. Roughly 5 years earlier, the New York–primarily based iStar had begun leasing the proving floor to the little-known limited-liability firm.

A lot about Route 14 Funding Companions stays unknown, as there’s minimal public info accessible in regards to the presumably automotive-related firm. Nevertheless, rumors persist that Route 14 Funding Companions is an organization associated to Apple’s automotive undertaking, as soon as—and probably nonetheless—often called “Challenge Titan.”

Apple followers level to purported statements from unnamed sources confirming this, in addition to the truth that Route 14 Funding Companions fashioned shortly after the tech large’s rumored automotive undertaking first got here to mild in early 2015. Additionally they notice that each Route 14 Funding Companions and Apple use CT Company’s Company Belief Firm, which serves as a registered agent for corporations that incorporate in Delaware, permitting companies to benefit from the First State’s tax advantages with out establishing devoted workplaces there.

The truth that a whole bunch of hundreds of different companies, together with Ford, Toyota, and Tesla, have used CT’s companies solely emphasizes the circumstantial nature of this skinny connection between Apple and Route 14 Funding Companions.

Autonomous in Arizona

Final month we flew to Arizona to go to Route 14 Funding Companions’ proving floor in Wittmann. With little precipitation and many sunshine, the sleepy unincorporated desert neighborhood, positioned roughly 35 miles northwest of Phoenix, is conducive to autonomous-vehicle testing.

Based mostly on what we witnessed whereas staking out the proving floor, we are able to verify the presence of self-driving-vehicle expertise at Route 14 Funding Companions’ facility. We captured photographs of a white fourth-generation Lexus RX, sensor stack mounted to its roof, present process testing inside the fenced-in perimeter of the proving floor.

Extra telling is the design of the sensor stack, which matches those who Apple has fitted to a number of Lexus RXs photographed in California. Photos of those autos are everywhere in the internet, and plenty of embrace a transparent view of every car’s license tag—info we used to drag the car identification quantity (VIN) for 5 of the California-registered Lexus SUVs.

We then crosschecked every VIN towards these listed inside California’s 2022 Autonomous Mileage Stories. (The Golden State requires any autonomous-vehicle developer testing its expertise on public roads to file information on system disengagements.) The outcome? All 5 VINs correlated with studies submitted by Apple.

Admittedly, it is doable that one other firm is toying with an analogous sensor-pack design. With none license plate or VIN info for the RX we noticed on the former DaimlerChrysler proving floor, our proof, although stronger than a shared registered agent in Delaware, nonetheless appeared too weak by itself to persuade a proverbial jury that this proves “past an affordable doubt” that Route 14 Funding Companions is an Apple offshoot.

Environmental Connection

Though we noticed nothing else of notice whereas staking out the proving floor, we did stumble throughout an indication posted excessive up on a portion of the chain-link fence surrounding the property:

Within the months earlier than our Arizona journey, we searched public-records databases for clues which may reveal further particulars about Route 14 Funding Companions. In all that point, we would by no means checked the Arizona Division of Environmental High quality (ADEQ) web site. It was actually an indication from above.

After leaving Wittmann and checking in to our resort in close by Shock, Arizona, we hunted for information posted on ADEQ’s web site, one in all which was for the water system on the proving floor. The doc lists the names and call info of the system’s administrative contact and proprietor. Each telephone numbers have Silicon Valley space codes, and the proprietor’s is shared with strains at Apple headquarters in Cupertino.

Neither particular person answered our calls. That mentioned, our analysis provides us purpose to consider that the listed proprietor, William Lynch, straight connects Route 14 Funding Companions to Apple.

As evidenced by Lynch’s Route 14 Funding Companions e mail tackle and the voicemail greeting of the telephone quantity listed within the ADEQ doc, Lynch doesn’t usually go by the identify William. Fairly, he goes by Ken. A short LinkedIn search introduced up the profile of an Apple worker named Ken Lynch who has spent near a decade working for the corporate within the area of setting, well being, and security. Not conclusive, however definitely fascinating.

As soon as once more, we seemed to public information for help, and we quickly got here throughout EPA paperwork that included contact info for an Apple-associated Ken Lynch.

We referred to as the quantity listed subsequent to Ken Lynch’s identify on these Apple-related EPA submissions and have been despatched to voicemail. A greeting practically indistinguishable from the one related to Lynch’s Route 14 Funding Companions telephone quantity addressed us on this line as effectively. We recorded each greetings and listened to them again to again a number of occasions.

We can’t declare with certainty that these two telephone numbers belong to the identical Ken Lynch till Lynch responds to our queries and places this query to mattress. For its half, Apple tell us that the corporate had nothing to share on the issues of its or its workers’ connections to Route 14 Funding Companions.

Is Apple All In?

For years, circumstantial proof drove the narrative that linked Route 14 Funding Companions to Apple’s automotive undertaking. Now we’ve got tougher proof that extra straight connects the 2 corporations.

If so, then Route 14 Funding Companions’ $125 million buy of the outdated DaimlerChrysler proving floor seems to point Apple’s monetary dedication to making a automotive of its personal, presumably one with profitability in thoughts. In spite of everything, Apple didn’t develop into a multi-trillion-dollar firm by haphazardly and needlessly spending a whole bunch of hundreds of thousands to develop financially futile merchandise.

Senior Editor

Regardless of their shared final identify, Greg Fink shouldn’t be associated to Ed “Massive Daddy” Roth’s notorious Rat Fink. Each Finks, nevertheless, are recognized for his or her love of vehicles, automotive tradition, and—unusually—monogrammed one-piece bathing fits. Greg’s profession within the media business goes again greater than a decade. His earlier expertise contains stints as an editor at publications equivalent to U.S. Information & World Report, The Huffington Publish, Motor1.com, and MotorTrend.