Apple hires a former Tesla engineer with expertise in interior design

A new report says that Apple has made another big hire with ties to the automotive industry.

According to a report from Bloomberg on Monday, Apple has hired Steve MacManus from Tesla. While at Tesla, MacManus was a vice president in charge of engineering for car interiors and exteriors. MacManus joined Tesla in 2015, after working for Bentley and Aston Martin before that.

MacManus, a Tesla vice president in charge of engineering for car interiors and exteriors, left the carmaker recently and has since joined Apple as a senior director, according to his LinkedIn profile. He worked at Tesla from 2015, after stints at Jaguar Land Rover, Bentley Motors and Aston Martin. His interior-design skills may be applicable at Apple beyond the development of a car. Apple didn’t respond to a request for comment on Monday.

MacManus’s LinkedIn profile does confirm that he is now a “Senior Director” at Apple. However, what he’s doing at Apple remains a mystery at the time. Interestingly enough, while MacManus obviously has plenty of history with automobiles, both for interior and exterior designs, the report indicates it’s possible he’s working on other projects at Apple.

This latest hire marks the arrival of a third engineer originally stationed at Tesla.

For its part, Apple is rumored to be working on a self-driving electric vehicle of some kind. Recently it was rumored that the vehicle in question is a van. Apple is also working on a autonomous driving systems, which it is actively testing in the real world. As such, it’s unknown what Project Titan –the Apple Car project– is actively working towards. Is it an actual self-driving vehicle? Or is Apple aiming to get its own autonomous driving systems in other branded cars?

Either way, the company’s car dreams appear to still be alive in some capacity or another. For now, at least.