CJ Moore, a former Autopilot software engineer for Tesla Inc., has left Apple’s secretive autonomous-vehicle project after just seven months.
Moore’s latest employer is Luminar, a company that makes lidar. Lidar is a technology used by most companies working on autonomous-driving systems — except Tesla, which uses only cameras for its Full Self-Driving feature and has labeled lidar a “crutch.”
Moore’s departure from Apple signals another shake-up for Project Titan, the tech company’s meandering effort to develop an autonomous vehicle.
Meanwhile, Luminar has managed to hire top talent from around the tech and auto industries; it also added Taner Ozcelik, the founder of Nvidia’s automotive business, last week.