Tesla debauchery as a fine blade for Apple to develop its autonomous cars – The Figaro

Chris Lattner, the developer of the programming language, Swift, will be joining Tesla as the vice-president of the system Autopilot.

To perfect its autonomous cars, Tesla surrounds himself with the best elements. The company of Elon Musk announced on Tuesday 10 January that it had hired Chris Lattner, a veteran of Apple. The creator of the programming language Swift will join the ranks of Tesla as vice-president of the Autopilot, the software support to the driving team vehicles of the company. Ultimately, the group seeks the complete autonomy of its cars.

In débauchant such a size of the programming at Apple, the automaker made a departure from its practices. In an interview granted to the media in German business paper Handelsblatt, Elon Musk had said it was the company of Tim Cook of the “cemetery of Tesla”, believing that any competent engineer of its own group had been recruited. “Apple has hired the people we fired,” he said then. The announcement also marks a shift in the balance of power between the two giants of the new technologies. “There was a year or two, Apple gave the impression to be in a position to threaten Tesla in the sector of motor cars”, recalls on his blog, John Gruber, an american programmer-creator of the programming language Markdown, specialist it company. “It seems now that Apple is no longer in the race, and that Tesla threatens its advance in terms of programming.”

The race for autonomous cars

The recruitment of Chris Lattner fits in a context of strong competition around the autonomous car. The automatic driving is the subject of sustained attention of automakers, from Audi to Volvo via Ford, but also of the great names of new technologies. Uber or even Nvidia, Intel, and Mobileye have expressed their interest in the topic.

in Mid-December, Google announced the launch of Waymo, a company fully dedicated to the development of software for autonomous cars. A hundred of minivans Chrysler Pacifica should test the functionality by the end of January. In search of growth, Apple has also unveiled its ambitions for the automobile industry. Despite the recruitment of engineers to scale – including Steve Zadesky, a former Ford or Chris Porritt, Tesla -the team of 1000 persons in charge of tackling the market of the construction of the autonomous car by 2020, has in recent months lost several hundred engineers in circumstances of turbulent, according to sources contacted by Bloomberg. The inability of the group to retain Chris Lattner teams in the development of his own vehicle, leaves nothing be a portent of good. The Apple As object of rumors and fantasies, might never see the light of day.