Apple Car Hardware Engineer Leaves for Air Taxi Startup

[MacRumors]

Apple's Car project recently lost one of its engineering directors, with Michael Schwekutsch departing the company to join air taxi startup Archer Aviation.

As discovered by CNBC, Schwekutsch updated his LinkedIn profile to note that he has taken on a role of senior vice president of engineering at Archer. Archer is an aerospace company that is developing an all-electric aircraft that supports vertical takeoff and landing for navigation within cities.

Schwekutsch first joined the Apple Car project in March of 2019, and he served as a senior director of engineering on the special project group, aka the Apple Car team. Prior to that, he was Tesla's vice president of engineering.

Apple's car development has seen continual management shifts over the course of the last few years. Back in September, special projects vice president Doug Field left Apple for Ford after a three-year stint heading up Apple Car development alongside Bob Mansfield and John Giannandrea.

AI chief John Giannandrea is still overseeing Apple Car development, but with Field's departure, Apple recently brought on Apple Watch chief Kevin Lynch to pitch in. Under Lynch's leadership, the Apple Car project is moving ahead, with Apple aiming to produce a fully autonomous electric vehicle. Apple wants to design a self-driving car that does not require human intervention, a goal that car manufacturers have yet to achieve.

Apple is planning to launch a self-driving car within four years with an aggressive launch timeline around 2025, but whether Apple can achieve that goal remains to be seen.

Article Link: Apple Car Hardware Engineer Leaves for Air Taxi Startup

 

[TheYayAreaLiving 🎗️]

Peace out and best of luck!

Working on floating taxi?

 

[Chaos215bar2]

The things rich people tell each other so they can feel better about themselves:

Humans were destined to explore. But we put ourselves inside vehicles that slowed us down. Not anymore. Experience how Archer’s eVTOL aircraft are powering everyday flight.

Archer’s marketing really is quite something.

 

[jz0309]

Apple is doomed!
An engineering director leaving, a project 10 years going strong that had so much turnover, change in direction, rumors, rumors and no deliverables ... I say there is no Apple car
/s

 

[joey0]

What is wrong with this project and why is the only thing we know about it the people who are leaving and coming in

 

[DocMultimedia]

I think the only thing this project does is hire people so they can do nothing and leave after one year. Goal of project: keep stock price high.

 

[Cosmosent]

IMO, Apple should have started-off with a 3.6-liter square-design in-line six ICE & with a six-speed manual transmission, so they could Fast Track the whole effort, & get it to the Track for proper testing !

And, if Apple had the bottom-end of the Engine properly-designed to support a 9K RPM redline, they could use it for PR everywhere !

And Yes, it would be referred to as the Apple Race Car !

The EV version could then be a follow-on effort.

Tim, are you seeing this ?

 

[Cosmosent]

I think the only thing this project does is hire people so they can do nothing and leave after one year. Goal of project: keep stock price high.

At some point, even Apple will need to deliver !

 

[tongxinshe]

After getting familiar with the situation, everyone know that Apple has a very slight chance of setting up a splash in this area. Apple stepped too late into this area, and makes progress too slowly. It falls farther and farther behind Google in the autonomous driving technology (mostly depend on the company's AI technology) and behind Tesla in the electronics vehicle building experience.

 

[chivkea]

How about instead of doing R&D on cars, open a division on battery R&D.

 

[koruki]

Anyone else think this so-called Apple Car is going to turn into the next Apple TV which went from premium high-end TV ... to a cheap little box you connect to your current TV?

 

[mdriftmeyer]

None of these ‘losses' are key personnel. They are managers. Whether from Apple, IBM, Sony, Tesla, Microsoft, you name it. They spend 95% of their time in office meetings, reading emails and checking up on progress of their teams work.

There was a reason Ives said the team at Apple was the strongest when he left. They were doing all the design work, with him having final oversight only. These MVP talents aren't athletes in professional sports. Stop sensationalizing them. Every key person in Apple has a special project(s) focus with scores of the best where they are constantly focused on their idea eventually reaching to market.

Drive train engineers aren't key personnel. You can hire dozens working on cutting edge projects in universities around the globe to replace them. Stock options take years to vest and when you jump you leave all unvested at the door. This guy took a post with a SVP because he's been promised this company when it goes public he'll get his huge pay day. In a startup, everyone is an SVP early on. Then the hierarchies are formed and the grunts come in and do the bulk of the work. The man worked at Apple for under 3 years. His options weren't large or he'd have stayed. His special projects group focus must not have kept his interest. You don't go from autonomous vehicles to sky cab because you are the most insightful financially.

 

[Danoc]

Anyone else think this so-called Apple Car is going to turn into the next Apple TV which went from premium high-end TV ... to a cheap little box you connect to your current TV?

I do.

The only car I could envision is a Car as a Service type of business. With a lot of automation and infotainment. Not your traditional dad's car.

 

[sdf]

It's weird how every staffing change on this project — which currently affects no consumers in the world — is breathlessly reported.

 

[thadoggfather]

So he does

How is this news

 

[citysnaps]

After getting familiar with the situation, everyone know that Apple has a very slight chance of setting up a splash in this area. Apple stepped too late into this area, and makes progress too slowly. It falls farther and farther behind Google in the autonomous driving technology (mostly depend on the company's AI technology) and behind Tesla in the electronics vehicle building experience.

This reminds me of the time Apple had the audacity to step up and compete against Motorola, Ericsson, and Nokia (at the time collectively referred to as MEN, all giants in the cellular telecom industry), creating iPhone.

 

[jz0309]

This reminds me of the time Apple had the audacity to step up and compete against Motorola, Ericsson, and Nokia (at the time collectively referred to as MEN, all giants in the cellular telecom industry), creating iPhone.

And how many years did Apple spend on creating the iPhone?
I think the Apple car is in the makes for at least 7 or 8 years…

How many EV manufacturers are out there today, besides the established big ones who also make EVs today? A lot…
The EV and autonomous world is moving FAST, Apple car is moving SLOW (if it even is as we do not have any useful information beyond the Lexus fleet)

 

[Kierkegaarden]

First off, it is only speculation that he was even working on an EV project at Apple. Maybe he was in charge of the Cloth project? Maybe he left because people had difficult pronouncing this last name? Maybe it doesn’t really matter what the reason is?

 

[jz0309]

None of these ‘losses' are key personnel. They are managers. Whether from Apple, IBM, Sony, Tesla, Microsoft, you name it. They spend 95% of their time in office meetings, reading emails and checking up on progress of their teams work.

There was a reason Ives said the team at Apple was the strongest when he left. They were doing all the design work, with him having final oversight only. These MVP talents aren't athletes in professional sports. Stop sensationalizing them. Every key person in Apple has a special project(s) focus with scores of the best where they are constantly focused on their idea eventually reaching to market.

Drive train engineers aren't key personnel. You can hire dozens working on cutting edge projects in universities around the globe to replace them. Stock options take years to vest and when you jump you leave all unvested at the door. This guy took a post with a SVP because he's been promised this company when it goes public he'll get his huge pay day. In a startup, everyone is an SVP early on. Then the hierarchies are formed and the grunts come in and do the bulk of the work. The man worked at Apple for under 3 years. His options weren't large or he'd have stayed. His special projects group focus must not have kept his interest. You don't go from autonomous vehicles to sky cab because you are the most insightful financially.

I am in agreement that these “losses” are over-reacted on, but you got some things wrong: stock options have long been replaced by RSUs, and the company this guy joined went public on NYSE in Dec 2020.

 

[jz0309]

First off, it is only speculation that he was even working on an EV project at Apple. Maybe he was in charge of the Cloth project? Maybe he left because people had difficult pronouncing this last name? Maybe it doesn’t really matter what the reason is?

Yep, welcome to MacRUMORS
Where only NEWS are reported LOL

 

[necrosexy]

An all-electric aircraft? I'm sure the mileage will be fantastic ...

 

[goobot]

This reminds me of the time Apple had the audacity to step up and compete against Motorola, Ericsson, and Nokia (at the time collectively referred to as MEN, all giants in the cellular telecom industry), creating iPhone.

Manufacturing an iPhone is pretty much the same as manufacturing an iPod, can’t say that about a car. A car holds literal lives in the balance, looking at the terrible state of Apple software lately, pushing for a fully autonomous car isn‘t going to succeed, no thanks to the added churn of this team

 

[citysnaps]

And how many years did Apple spend on creating the iPhone?
I think the Apple car is in the makes for at least 7 or 8 years…

How many EV manufacturers are out there today, besides the established big ones who also make EVs today? A lot…
The EV and autonomous world is moving FAST, Apple car is moving SLOW (if it even is as we do not have any useful information beyond the Lexus fleet)

Got it. Apple must be doomed. Again.

You might not be aware of the vast differences in complexities involved in designing a cellular phone (with previous Motorola insight/knowledge via ROKR) and designing and manufacturing an automobile that's potentially self-driving.

 

[now i see it]

He won’t stay at his next job long either. He sounds like the impatient type.

 

[jz0309]

Got it. Apple must be doomed. Again.

You might not be aware of the vast differences in complexities involved in designing a cellular phone (with previous Motorola insight/knowledge via ROKR) and designing and manufacturing an automobile that's potentially self-driving.

See my post #4

You were drawing similarities to iPhone, so not sure who is lacking understanding of iPhone to a car