Tesla is one company that seems to be in the news almost every day right now, with the reason it is making headlines today being that the car maker is seeing its former employees pop up at companies that may become competitors in the future.
First off, we have former Tesla Vice-President of Vehicle Engineering Chris Porritt who, having left the company last year, is now said to have popped up in Cupertino, apparently aligned to Apple’s fledgling car project. Said to have been hired to work on “special projects,” which many are taking to mean Project Titan, Porritt has a wealth of experience at both Land Rover and Aston Martin as well as the time spent at one of the world’s hottest car companies.
Tesla’s Elon Musk has commented on the cross pollination that continues to happen between Apple and Tesla before, saying that “we always jokingly call Apple the ‘Tesla Graveyard.’ If you don’t make it at Tesla, you go work at Apple.” Given Porritt’s resume, we find it hard to imagine he didn’t make the grade at Tesla, but we’re sure Musk knows better than we do.
There’s currently believed to be an empty spot at the top of Project Titan, with Steve Zadesky, the Apple executive believed to be heading up the project, reported as having left the company recently.
Apple isn’t the only company on the lookout for ex-Tesla talent, though. Comma.ai, the autonomous car startup founded by George Hotz has apparently recruited one of Tesla’s senior engineers as well. Hotz is well known for hacking iPhones and PlayStations amongst other things, and is also acquainted with Tesla’s Elon Musk. According to Forbes, the engineer named as Riccardo Biasini will work on integrating the autonomous software with the car itself, allowing it to drive with no human interaction.
With Comma.ai still very much in the startup phase, it’s certainly no competition for Tesla or even Apple at this stage, but with ex-Tesla employees on its payroll, there’s a certain buzz surrounding the latest project to come from the popular “Geohot” and there is certainly no doubting the guy’s talents. Whether those talents are enough to get a car company off the ground, though, we will just have to wait and see.
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