While little has been revealed about Apple's interests in electric cars, Tesla CEO Elon Musk is confident that the tech giant is determined to enter the environmentally friendly vehicle field.
The entrepreneur told BBC News in an exclusive interview at his design studio near Los Angeles that it is an "open secret" that Apple is looking to challenge Tesla, adding that it was "obvious" that the Cupertino, Calif.-based company would try to make its own electric vehicle.
Apple has not made any official announcements regarding its production of such a vehicle, but its recent registering of automobile-related Internet domains like apple.car and apple.auto hint at the possibility.
"It's pretty hard to hide something if you hire over a thousand engineers to do it," Musk said, having previously accused Apple of hiring former Tesla employees.
Apple CEO Tim Cook has stayed quite about his company's involvement in the electric car market, saying in a conference call in October, when asked about building such a vehicle, that, "We'll see what we do in the future," according to NBC News.
"I do think that industry is at an inflection point for massive change. Not just an evolutionary change," Cook added.
Musk, however, didn't seem worried about being challenged by Apple, saying that Apple joining the EV game "will expand the industry."
If Apple does decide to make its own electric car, it would join the long list of contenders that Tesla has to deal with, which includes Nissan, BMW, Internet search giant Google and China-backed startup Faraday Future, which debuted its all-electric car concept at CES 2016 last week.
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