Americans Really Want an Apple Car, Study Finds

With a total market capitalization of around $700 billion and nearly $250 billion in cash and securities lying around, Apple has enough money and power to do, well, pretty much anything. But the product that consumers want the company to build more than anything else, according to a new study? An Apple Car. 

That's according to an online survey of 3,000 American respondents conducted by the investment bank Baird, according to Investor's Business Daily. When asked what they'd most like to see Apple develop in the next five years, 21.6 percent of those survey-takers said they wanted to see the Silicon Valley company make a car. (That was closely followed by a desire to see Apple develop its own video streaming service, followed in turn by a virtual reality headset.)

As regular readers of The Drive know, rumors that Apple might be develop its own automobile have been swirling about for years. Recent reports have suggested the company has since switched gears, choosing instead to pursue developing technology for future vehicles rather than the cars themselves. But the report suggest there's still plenty of desire among the masses for a full-blown Apple Car. 

Baird analyst William Power suggested that Apple might not have to build its own car (or streaming service, for that matter) from scratch. Given the amount of cash it has on hand, he said, the tech company could easily buy its own car company. 

"Tesla and Netflix, followed by Disney, are the names we hear most as potential acquisition targets," Power wrote in the report. "All are theoretically possible, but unlikely in our judgment."

Tesla's market cap, as of Monday, was at around $43 billion. 

Last year, a report surfaced suggestion Apple was considering purchasing McLaren for somewhere between $1.5–$2 billion. McLaren CEO Mike Flewitt later said that the two companies had indeed entered discussions, but that they had been unable to come to an agreement.