Electric motorcycle company blames collapse on Apple’s talent poaching

Mission Motors claims that Apple’s poaching of top engineers caused the company to fold, Reuters reports. Despite financial struggles, former Chief Executive Derek Kaufman said the company could have kept going if it hadn’t lost key employees to Apple, a development that further complicated fundraising efforts. “Mission had a great group of engineers, specifically electric drive expertise,” Kaufman said. “Apple knew that — they wanted it, and they went and got it.” A key investor backed out of funding Mission after two engineers jumped ship for Apple last fall, and more employees followed in the next few months, including the company’s director of power train systems engineering and vice president of software and electrical engineering. Apple decliend to comment on the situation at Mission, but the company has taken heat for poaching employees for its electric car project before, most recently settling out of court with battery manufacturer A123 after luring five of its top employees to Apple last June.