Apple trying 'very hard' with $250K bonuses to nab Tesla engineers as van sightings proliferate
According to Tesla CEO Elon Musk, Apple has made a major push to recruit talent from the electric carmaker, offering massive bonuses and significant salary bumps for those willing to come to work in Cupertino.
One of the camera-equipped vans thought to belong to Apple, spotted by AppleInsider reader matthawaii in Hawaii.
Apple has put as much as $250,000 in signing bonuses and 60 percent raises on the table for its targets, Bloomberg reports. Despite the gargantuan size of those figures, few Tesla employees have jumped ship, while more than 150 former Apple workers have moved to Tesla.
"Apple tries very hard to recruit from Tesla," Musk said. "But so far they've actually recruited very few people."
Word of Apple's interest in Tesla employees comes days after the iPhone maker was revealed to be behind a fleet of mysterious camera-equipped vans that have popped up around the Bay Area in recent weeks. The vans sport more than a dozen cameras and what appear to be LiDAR modules for high-resolution mapping strapped to an x-shaped carriage on their roof.
Some, like technology analyst Rob Enderle, believe those vans are test mules for new self-driving car technology. An alternative --?and more likely --?scenario is that Apple is preparing a major data collection initiative for Apple Maps, much like Google's Street View project.
While the vans were first seen in San Francisco and New York, they have since been spotted in a number of more far-flung places. AppleInsider readers report sightings in Wisconsin, Hawaii, and Panama City, Panama.
One of the camera-equipped vans thought to belong to Apple, spotted by AppleInsider reader matthawaii in Hawaii.
Apple has put as much as $250,000 in signing bonuses and 60 percent raises on the table for its targets, Bloomberg reports. Despite the gargantuan size of those figures, few Tesla employees have jumped ship, while more than 150 former Apple workers have moved to Tesla.
"Apple tries very hard to recruit from Tesla," Musk said. "But so far they've actually recruited very few people."
Word of Apple's interest in Tesla employees comes days after the iPhone maker was revealed to be behind a fleet of mysterious camera-equipped vans that have popped up around the Bay Area in recent weeks. The vans sport more than a dozen cameras and what appear to be LiDAR modules for high-resolution mapping strapped to an x-shaped carriage on their roof.
Some, like technology analyst Rob Enderle, believe those vans are test mules for new self-driving car technology. An alternative --?and more likely --?scenario is that Apple is preparing a major data collection initiative for Apple Maps, much like Google's Street View project.
While the vans were first seen in San Francisco and New York, they have since been spotted in a number of more far-flung places. AppleInsider readers report sightings in Wisconsin, Hawaii, and Panama City, Panama.
Comments
2. Why didn't Apple start this initiative 3 years ago?
I've heard people on the forums here saying Flyover is way better than Google Street View but that's not what I hear people saying. People overwhelmingly like and use street view than Flyover. Flyover is more like a great way to demonstrate an iPad or look around a city BEFORE visiting. Not while you're there.
So we've gone from anti-poaching to kidnapping?
So does Apple want them for their battery experience or their rocket building experience?
If I had that same choice, I'd choose Tesla as well. It's a fantastic company with a disruptive vision and a great work environment.
Sounds like they're very much like Apple but selling electric cars instead of personal computing devices.
Those must be quite high-level staff to get those salaries and that's quite a lot of people. Apple employs tens of thousands of people - about 46,000 non-retail staff but 150 seems like a lot of high-level people to lose. Maybe they aren't trying to get Tesla engineers as much as their own engineers back again and they don't want to go back.
Some ex-Apple people said that Apple wasn't a great place to work because of having to work so much and not having much of a personal life. Rather than trying to pay one engineer a huge salary to work in those conditions, it seems like it would be more sensible just to lighten up on the workload and hire 2 engineers for the role. I'm sure they'd take a good work/life balance over a huge salary. The only reason the huge salary is attractive is to quit sooner.
There are similar complaints about Tesla though:
http://www.glassdoor.co.uk/Reviews/Tesla-Motors-Reviews-E43129.htm
"To be successful (which you can be) you will need to give up anything else. working 90+ hour weeks is normal and giving up any personal commitments for a Tesla one is expected. The pace of the business is so aggressive that a "just get it done" culture can lead to semi chaotic and inefficient working practice. There was also a cut throat culture among senior management to throw your colleges under the bus if they failed.
Advice to Management
Clearly striking a better work life balance is going to be important to prevent employee burnout."
"They expect a lot of hours and personal time to be used for working out of the office. For people who enjoy what they do, this is not much of an issue but it can sometimes be overwhelming to have a day off where you spend 40% of the time on your laptop or phone."
"Work life balance is disproportionate heavily favoring the work" (in 29 reviews)
"No work life balance work 6 days one day off" (in 11 reviews)
Apple overall has better reviews but more of the negative work/life balance reviews:
http://www.glassdoor.co.uk/Reviews/Apple-Reviews-E1138.htm
"Time off needs to be requested well in advance making work/life balance a challenge" (in 252 reviews)
"Work can be very demanding with long hours depending on the group you are in" (in 151 reviews)
If I had that same choice, I'd choose Tesla as well. It's a fantastic company with a disruptive vision and a great work environment.
I understand Musk also fires people as if it were a bodily function (to paraphrase George Costanza from Seinfeld), so your time as an employee could be limited.
Since Apple most likely will never speak about hires, Elon can say almost anything he wants to say. Do not get me wrong, I like Elon enough to follow him on Twitter. He has charisma.
Now, if Apple really is looking to hire Tesla employees, I hope Apple does not rehire the security woman who left Apple for Tesla then chose to bad mouth Apple when a security bug was discovered shortly after her leaving Apple. She deserves to stay exactly where she is!
On another note, if Apple really is trying to hire Tesla people, I am guessing Apple is trying to hire people with battery experience. Mobile telephone batteries do not sound nearly as exciting as electric car batteries, IMHO.
Couldn't be after CarPlay talent, could they?
(also, that headline is perfect)
It would be cool of Apple could not only capture photos at street level, but collect enough depth data to create 3D "street views" that one could navigate, similar to flyover.
**********"The Revolution will not be televised", but it will be Electrified.************
Billions possibly trillions of dollars are up for grabs at the cost of millions of jobs. The rich getting richer then fleeing the country. The writing is on the wall but all most Americans are focused on is their piece of the pie. WAKE UP AMERICA your corporations, politicians and leader are taking you for idiots.
That's my thought too. They could want Tesla engineers for their battery expertise. Or maybe just really good engineers left Apple and Apple is trying to poach them back.
150 engineers is nothing for the size of Apple. In Silicon Valley, there is a revolving door between the companies. People CONSTANTLY move between the companies. I wouldn't be surprised if Tesla didn't poach just as many from Google. Also, the reason people are currently staying at Tesla is probably because it's still a startup and fast growing(no doubt Google has also been trying to poach from Tesla).
There are reasons why so many engineers leave Apple/Google/etc to join a new startup. THere's much more upside.
However, as soon as there are signs of Tesla growth coming to an end, watch for the rats jumping ship.
I much prefer flyover and 3d view than googles street view. God I haven't used street view in forever
I wouldn't step on Tesla's toes. Seems like a goog move.
I've heard people on the forums here saying Flyover is way better than Google Street View but that's not what I hear people saying. People overwhelmingly like and use street view than Flyover. Flyover is more like a great way to demonstrate an iPad or look around a city BEFORE visiting. Not while you're there.
To each their own. I use StreetView mainly on my desktop/laptop and even then, it gets minimal use from me. Google's iOS app is a joke for StreetView. I still to this day have trouble trying to get streetview to display on my iPhone that I don't even use it anymore on my iPhone/iPad.
I love Apple's Flyover. It's a far more polished interface than GoogleMaps is. I'm looking forward to what Apple has in store to make it more social-media connected and incorporating an equivalent StreetView module. If anyone can get it right for the masses, it's Apple. Google caters to the tech-heads, and their interfaces definitely show it.
Really the work assigned will increase if you hire more engineers. And believe it or not sometimes apple will pay good money for engineers and not just ex-CEOs of clothing companies.
I wonder what the Tesla engineers have though? Battery expertise?
Only a clown would think Apple is working on self driving cars, at least at this point. Completely bonkers. It's for Maps, you clown.
I find it hard to believe Apple is going into the mini-van business. Soccer moms everywhere will be so disappointed.
I think Apple is more interested in hiring them for battery technology since the Apple Watch won't even last 24 hours.
Will work for lightning...