The recent spate of hires and patent filings reviewed by Reuters shows that Apple is fast building its industrial lithium-ion battery...
The recent spate of hires and
patent filings reviewed by Reuters shows that Apple is fast building its
industrial lithium-ion battery capabilities, adding to evidence the
iPhone maker may be developing a car.
Quiet,
clean electric cars are viewed in Silicon Valley and elsewhere as a
promising technology for the future, but high costs and "range anxiety",
the concern that batteries will run out of power and cannot be
recharged quickly, remain obstacles. Those challenges could also be seen
as opportunities to find solutions to take the technology mainstream.
The
number of auto-related patents filed by Apple, Google Inc (GOOGL.O),
Korea's Samsung (005930.KS), electric carmaker Tesla Motors Inc (TSLA.O)
and ride-sharing startup Uber tripled from 2011 to 2014, according to
an analysis by Thomson Reuters IP & Science of public patent
filings.
Apple has filed far
fewer of these patents than rivals, perhaps adding impetus to its
recent hiring binge as it seeks to get up to speed in battery
technologies and other car-building related expertise.
As
of 18 months ago, Apple had filed for 290 such patents. By contrast,
Samsung, which has been providing electric vehicle batteries for some
years, had close to 900 filings involving auto battery technology alone.
The US government makes
patent applications public only after 18 months, so the figures do not
reflect any patents filed in 2014.
Earlier
this month, battery maker A123 Systems sued Apple for poaching five top
engineers. A search of LinkedIn profiles indicates Apple has hired at
least another seven A123 employees and at least 18 employees from Tesla
since 2012.
The former A123
employees have expertise primarily in battery cell design, materials
development and manufacturing engineering, according to the LinkedIn
profiles and an analysis of patent applications.
A123,
which filed for bankruptcy in 2012 but has since reorganized, supplied
batteries for Fisker Automotive’s now-discontinued hybrid electric car.
