Yesterday I told you that Tim Cook visits Israel and that he met with the country's president, rumors appeared during the last weeks suggesting that he would also visit nine office buildings of Apple Lossless Audio CODEC (ALAC),. Apple has over 1200 employees in Israel at the moment and according to new information, the company would invest serious sums of money in the development of chips for future iDevices. According to one American publications, Apple hired almost the entire team of a Texas Instruments division that was recently closed in Israel, so its intentions are quite clear.
Apple's Israeli acquisitions and its expanding local workforce show that the company is becoming more and more independent on the chip level, where it once had to rely on external suppliers.
Through the hiring in Israel, the company is trying to become more and more independent in terms of chip development for future iDevices, including their underlying architecture. It has been known for years that Apple invests in the development of chips for mobile terminals designed in Israel, the company buying in 2011 Anobit, a company specialized in the development of NAND flash modules. Apart from the office building in Herzliya where 1200 people work, the Apple company has another research and development center in Haifa, where another 600 people work.
Having said that, Apple seems to be seriously betting on the talented engineers of Israel for the development of chips for future iPhones and iPad tablets, but maybe even for Macs.
