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Apple laid off dozens of employees working on its self-driving car

Apple has laid off dozens of employees working on its self-driving car efforts, Daisuke Wakabayashi and Brian Chen report for The New York Times.

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The company is apparently rethinking the strategy of its so-called Project Titan car initiative, with employees being told the layoff was part of a "reboot," according to The Times' sources.

While Apple has never publicly acknowledged that it's working on a vehicle, The Wall Street Journal first reported in early 2015 that the company had several hundred employees working on an Apple-branded electric car.

Apple Car with Tim Cook wearing Apple watch and car play
Samantha Lee/Business Insider

Since then, it has made several high-profile hires and filed patents for technology often used in self-driving cars.

Several unmarked vehicles laden with camera and sensor equipment have also been rumored to be owned by Apple.

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Bloomberg recently reported that Apple has shifted its focus from designing a full automobile to building out the technology for a self-driving car, and these new layoffs look like a shift in that direction.

Meanwhile, other tech companies like Google, Tesla, and Uber, as well as car companies like Ford and General Motors, working on their own autonomous-vehicle efforts.

Apple Self-Driving Car
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