Fueling more speculations that Apple is hard at work on a groundbreaking electric car, the Cupertino company has added another auto industry veteran to its burgeoning team of automotive specialists. Former chief of global quality at Fiat Chrysler, Doug Betts, joined Apple this month, according his updated LinkedIn page:
“Doug Betts, who led global quality at Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV until last year, is now working for the Cupertino, Calif.-based electronics giant but declined to comment on the position when reached Monday. Mr. Betts’ LinkedIn profile says he joined Apple in July and describes his title as “Operations – Apple Inc.” with a location in the San Francisco Bay Area but no further specifics.”
First reported by The Wall Street Journal, Betts has served in various senior roles at Nissan Motors Manufacturing, Toyota Motors manufacturing, and Michelin before his seven-year stint at Fiat Chrysler Automobiles (FCA). He left Chrysler in October of 2014 after it received poor quality rankings in Consumer Reports rankings.
In addition to Betts, the WSJ also notes that Apple also “recently recruited one of the leading autonomous-vehicle researchers in Europe.”
This other hire could be Paul Furgale, who used to be the deputy director of ETH Zurich’s Autonomous Systems Lab. At ETH, Furgale worked on systems that could provide long-term autonomy for mobile robotic systems: computer vision, mapping, making decisions in highly dynamic environments, and so on. If Apple is indeed working on a self-driving car, Furgale would be a fine hire.
The WSJ reports that, since joining Apple, Furgale has been hiring other automation and computer vision experts, too.
But perhaps, the biggest proof of Apple’s electric car pursuits seems to from Fiat Chrysler’s CEO Sergio Marchionne who, following a meeting with Apple, recently told the press, that its CEO Tim Cook is “interested in Apple’s intervention in the car.”
Apple has been in an ongoing poaching war with Tesla, another electric car pioneer and maker of the well-received Model S and Roadster cars. Earlier this year, Tesla CEO Elon Musk pointed out that his company has poached 5 times as many employees from Apple as Apple has from Tesla. Musk also commented that he “hopes” Apple will enter the car market.
According to a report from Bloomberg earlier this year, Apple’s electric car is expected to reach markets by 2020.That may sound like too long a wait, but is actually an ambitious goal for a project of this magnitude, giving Apple just six years to learn (or buy) everything it needs to know about building a vehicle. That’s where the recent hiring spree and the past year of team-building come into play.
