Apple reportedly hired a longtime Ford executive for its car project

The long-gestating car project is being worked on by an Apple engineer and an executive from Ford. Desi Ujkashevic has been with the company since 1991. Ujkashevic was the global director of automotive safety engineering at Ford before he left the company in March.

She oversaw the global body engineering team, safety engineering for Ford of Europe and the global design technical operations division. In her early years at Ford, she held roles in vehicle engineering, testing and durability. She worked on regulatory issues for Ford. She seems like the kind of person you would want to hire for an EV project.

Apple is said to have begun work on a vehicle in 2015. The efforts have suffered setbacks due to strategy and staffing changes. Doug Field, who was said to have led Project Titan, left Apple to return to Ford. The hiring of Ujkashevic is another sign that Apple is still trying to build its own EV.

In a recent LinkedIn post, Ujkashevic said she was excited to start her next adventure and hoped to continue to contribute to society and advance technology with a purpose.