The Employee Poaching Between Apple and Tesla

It’s been a bit of a nightmare for the HR department at Tesla. Apple’s got some kind of super-secret project that has them poaching people from Tesla. From Yahoo! Finance.

While rumors about a potential merger between the electric car maker and consumer electronics giant have swirled for years, a new Bloomberg reportsuggests that Tesla has recruited at least 150 employees from Apple — more than any other company, including competing car firms.

The hires have been in departments as varied as engineering, legal, design, retail and training. And Tesla isn’t alone in looking to lure tech luminaries into the auto sphere. As cars are becoming increasingly like computers, automakers are shifting their focus from Detroit to Silicon Valley in an attempt to tap top engineers, Bloomberg reports.

Traditional auto companies are having less luck than Tesla, however, which already counts many spiritual similarities with Apple. “From a design philosophy, [Apple] is relatively closely aligned,” Tesla’s co-founder and CEO, Elon Musk, told the outlet.

Telsa makes awesome electric cars. Apple makes some of the finest computer and consumer hardware in the world. With nearly $200 billion in the bank, Apple could buy Tesla with the money they find in the couch cushions in reception at 1 Infinite Loop.  Might they?