GM hires former Apple Pay and iCloud directors for software and services team – source

GM continues to hire current and former Apple employees as it rejects CarPlay from its EVs. General Motors has hired former directors of Apple Pay and iCloud to work on GM’s new software and services division, according to a source who shared hiring details with 9to5Mac.

The first hire is David Richardson, GM’s new vice president of software and services. Prior to being hired by GM, Richardson worked at Apple for nearly 12 years. His last role at Apple was director of engineering for Apple’s cloud infrastructure. In that role, Richardson oversaw the teams behind Apple services including iCloud, FaceTime, and Siri.

GM also hired Baris Cetinok who previously worked at Apple for nine years until 2021. During his time at Apple, Cetinok worked as a senior director over product management and marketing for iCloud, Apple Pay, and other digital services.

Both new hires report to Mike Abbott, GM’s senior vice president of software and services. Abbott left Apple for GM earlier this year. Abbott reports directly to GM CEO Marry Barra.

The hiring is part of a major effort at GM to build its own infotainment system and unlock new revenue streams. That’s also the motive behind dropping Apple CarPlay support in new GM electric vehicles. Instead, GM sees the shift to EVs as an opportunity to create its own closed system like Tesla and Rivian.

Ford also hired a high-level executive this year to run its own services division. Peter Stern, Apple services SVP Eddy Cue’s deputy, left the company to join Ford last month. Apple, of course, has reportedly spent several years on autonomous car software and/or hardware, although the company has never acknowledged the project publicly.

We’ve reached out to GM for comment and will update if we hear back.