Feeling a lack of enthusiasm for Apple's new products recently? Give the Cupertino tech giant another five to seven years, and it could introduce something totally new: a car.

In a new investors note, analyst Ming-Chi Kuo of TF International Securities predicts that the rumored Apple Car will make its debut between 2023 and 2025, according to MacRumors, and become the trillion-dollar company's "next star product."

"The reasons for this are as follows: (1) Potentially huge replacement demands are emerging in the auto sector because it is being redefined by new technologies," Kuo writes. "The case is the same as the smartphone sector 10 years ago; (2) Apple's leading technology advantages (e.g. AR) would redefine cars and differentiate Apple Car from peers' products; (3) Apple's service will grow significantly by entering the huge car finance market via Apple Car, and (4) Apple can do a better integration of hardware, software, and service than current competitors in the consumer electronics sector and potential competitors in the auto sector."

The prediction follows a recent revelation that Apple has rehired Tesla's Senior VP of Engineering, Doug Field. The engineer previously worked for Apple as a product designer and VP of Mac hardware engineering before joining Tesla, where he has spent the last five years overseeing engineering, with a particular focus on the Model 3. Now he's back at Apple as part of the company's car effort, dubbed Project Titan.

Rumors about a self-driving electric Apple Car have been circulating for years, but word spread in late 2016 that Apple had "drastically scaled back" its car team, shifting its focus to creating software rather than an actual vehicle. Apple hasn't made any promises about whether it will release a self-driving car in the future, but CEO Tim Cook last year acknowledged that the company is working on the brains of one, which he referred to as "the mother of all AI projects."

"I think there is a major disruption looming there," Cook said at the time. "Not only for self-driving cars, but also the electrification piece."

(Image courtesy of Design by Meni Tsibas; find him on YouTube.)