Earlier this year, Texas Instruments announced a major shift in its business strategy: it’s going to be moving its focus away from smartphone and tablet processors, and towards embedded applications like in-car computer systems.
As a result of this new strategy, the company said that it would be laying off a staggering 1,700 employees — one of the biggest RIFs of the year. But don’t feel too bad, the word is that some of them have found new homes at Apple…
The Next Web reports:
“Apple has been expanding its workforce in Israel over the past couple of weeks, tapping a pool of former Texas Instruments (TI) employees in the country to build up research and development centers in Hertezliya and Haifa, The Next Web has learned.
According to sources close to the situation, Apple has been hiring “dozens” of engineers from Texas Instruments after the company begun cutting around 250 jobs from its Ra’anana development center as it looks to lay off around 1,700 employees (about 5 percent of its total workforce) globally.”
The site says that many of the engineers working at the development center were focused on the development of TI’s OMAP processor and Wi-Fi and Bluetooth radio chips. So you can see why Apple would be interested in their skills.
Apparently they’ll be focusing on projects for SVP Bob Mansfield, who came out of retirement to head up Apple’s Technologies division in wake of last month’s shakeup. This group is responsible for things like Apple’s Ax processor line.
Apple’s obviously interested in beefing up its semi-conductor tech. Late last year, it acquired Anobit, a 200-employee fabless semiconductor company based in Israel. Expect to see some big things from it on this front in the future.