According to people familiar with the matter, Apple canceled the electric vehicle project and turned the team to generative artificial intelligence, and the company is gradually ending its decade-long electric vehicle exploration program.
Apple's internal disclosure of the news on February 27 came as a surprise to the nearly 2,000 employees involved in the project, and the decision was made by Jeff Williams, chief operating officer, and Kevin Lynch, vice president in charge of the work.
Two executives told employees that the project will begin to phase out, and that Long of the team in charge of the car will be transferred to the AI department led by executive officer John Giannandrea, who will focus on generative AI projects, an increasingly critical priority for the company. The Apple Car team also has hundreds of hardware engineers and car designers who have the potential to apply for jobs on other Apple teams.
After the news, Apple's stock price, which had fallen nearly 0.9% during the midday session on Tuesday, continued to rebound, rising more than 1% after turning higher at midday, and as of the close, Apple was at $182.63, up 0.81%, with a Market Cap of $2.8 trillion.
At the same time, in the face of potential competitors withdrawing from the track, Elon Musk posted two emojis on social platforms, commenting on Apple's cancellation of the car-building plan.
It is reported that Apple's car-making history can be traced back to 2014, when approved by Cook, Apple launched the Titan plan, and then used the "money power" to poach from Google, Mercedes-Benz, TSL and other companies, and formed a core team with Silicon Valley + automotive industry genes.
By the end of 2019, Apple had poached more than 300 people from TSL. Later, due to Apple's repeated vacillation in the route and direction of car manufacturing, and the delay in the implementation of cooperation objects and forms, the executives involved in the Titan project left a large number of people, and the project was stalled several times. (Changjiang Daily)