Apple programming language creator Swift becomes CEO of Tesla Autopilot software

Automaker Tesla has hired Chris Lattner to head its Autopilot Software division. Lattner worked at Apple since 2005 and was the founder of the programming language Swift. Tesla wants to make fully autonomous driving possible with all its cars.

Tesla makes Lattner vice president of its Autopilot Software division. Until recently, that role was filled by Jinnah Hosein, who is also Vice President of Software at SpaceX. Now that Lattner has been appointed as the CEO of Tesla’s software division, Hosein can fully focus on his job at Elon Musk’s aerospace company.

Before working at Apple, Chris Lattner was one of the main authors of the LLVM compiler. He joined Apple in 2005 and held various positions there. In 2010, he began work on Swift, the programming language introduced in 2014. In recent years, Lattner has headed the development tools team. Apple has not yet announced anything about Lattner’s departure. It is not known who will take over his position.

Tesla has already attracted several big names from the tech industry. In early 2016, Jim Keller was appointed vice president of the Autopilot Hardware division. Keller is a prominent CPU architect who was responsible for several AMD CPUs and Apple Socs. In October, Tesla announced that all cars of the brand will receive hardware that should enable fully autonomous driving in the future.