Back in late 2020, Elon Musk said he had reached out to Tim Cook to talk about Apple acquiring Tesla years back when the automaker was struggling. However, Cook said he had never spoken with Musk. Now in a new interview, while skipping a question about Apple Car, Cook shared more details on what happened with Musk.
In December 2020, Tesla CEO Elon Musk confirmed rumors that he attempted to sell the company to Apple but that Tim Cook didn’t even take a meeting with him. Here’s what Musk said:
During the darkest days of the Model 3 program, I reached out to Tim Cook to discuss the possibility of Apple acquiring Tesla (for 1/10 of our current value). He refused to take the meeting.
A few months later, Tim Cook said he had never spoken to Musk but had “great admiration and respect for the company he has built.”
In a new interview for The New York Times DealBook conference, Tim Cook shared more about the events around Musk’s claims.
CNBC’s Andrew Ross Sorkin asked about Apple Car with Cook avoiding the topic. And that led Sorkin to ask about Musk seeking out an Apple acquisition:
Sorkin: Let me try out this then, I think was a couple of years ago as you know, Elon Musk, he has been public about it try to get a meeting with you to sell Tesla to you in fact because the company was struggling, now of course the company has a trillion-dollar market value, you apparently did not take the meeting, in retrospect do you wish you did?
Cook reiterated that he has never spoken with Musk, but shared the new details that even though he didn’t realize Musk was trying to get in touch, he trusts that he did.
Cook: You know, I’ve never spoken to Elon. And there are lots of companies out there that we could’ve bought at different times probably. But I feel really good about where we are today.
Sorkin: Did you know he was trying to get to you?
Cook: I don’t remember it being like that. But he said that he did, and so I assume that that’s correct.
During the new interview, Cook also revealed that he owns cryptocurrency and it is also something that Apple is “looking at.”
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