Calling Apple’s much-rumored electric car project an “open secret,” Tesla founder Elon Musk on Monday told the BBC that he doesn’t foresee an Apple-developed car as becoming a threat to Tesla sales.
While he declined to offer specifics, Musk seemed confident in telling the BBC that Apple is indeed working on an electric car that would compete with Tesla’s lineup.
“It’s pretty hard to hide something if you hire over a thousand engineers to do it,” Musk commented. Apple has been hiring a number of engineers, developers, and other professionals from the established automotive world.
While the Cupertino firm has been known to “poach” employees from Tesla, so has the established electric car builder also taken valuable manpower from Apple. Musk commented in October that Apple was a “graveyard” for engineers who “didn’t make it” at Tesla.
Musk says he doesn’t see an Apple-built vehicle as a threat to his company, saying it will expand the industry. “Tesla will still aspire to make the most compelling electric vehicles, and that would be our goal, while at the same time helping other companies to make electric cars as well.”
While Apple has not formally announced it is working on any type of vehicle, it did recently register a trio of automobile-related internet domains, including apple.car, apple.cars, and apple.auto.