Apple Lays Off 600+ Employees After Canceling Car Project
Apple this week filed a required notice with the state of California, confirming plans to permanently lay off more than 600 employees. Under California law, employers must give employees and state representatives a 60-day notice before a mass layoff event.
The employees listed are located in several Apple-occupied buildings around Santa Clara, California, which is close to Apple's Cupertino headquarters. Several of these locations were rumored to be associated with Apple Car development in the past, so it is likely that these layoffs are related to Apple's decision to stop work on the car project.
Apple officially ended development on the Apple Car in March. Approximately 2,000 employees working on the Apple Car were told that the project was winding down at that time, and Apple began the process of moving some of them to work on artificial intelligence under John Giannandrea and in other relevant departments.
Other employees were given 90 days to apply for open positions within the company, but Apple hired hardware engineers and car designers while working on the Apple Car, and these employees may not have had skills applicable to other projects.
Apple also recently ended development on in-house microLED displays, so some of the layoffs might also be related to the decision to discontinue that work.
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Top Rated Comments
I want them to prove me wrong.
With a team that large you’d think they would have really been able to create something amazing.
Apple got into the automobile space - at least in research and development - because there was a prevailing thought that revolutionary advancements in automation were around the corner. I think many in the tech industry - and financing side of tech - got swept up by charlatans who knew how to drum up investment in a speculation-friendly economic climate (low interest rates).
There has been a broad understanding that full-self driving isn't happening soon on any appreciable business time scale that matters to investors. Apple got into the space because they thought they could be a leader in an emerging product space but instead were just going to be making something that other luxury brands have a century advantage on them.