Apple has bought autonomous vehicle startup Drive.ai for an undisclosed amount as part of the multinational tech company’s plans for the self-driving vehicles market.

In a recent filing with California regulators, the start-up disclosed that it planned to cut 90 jobs.

Drive.ai was founded in 2015 by machine-learning researchers of Stanford University. It has been operating test shuttles in two Texan cities of Arlington and Frisco.

Since February, the firm was reportedly looking for a buyer.

According to Axios news site, Apple has appointed several hardware and software engineers from Drive.ai.

Apple is competing against rivals such as Alphabet’s Waymo to develop autonomous vehicles. As part of these efforts, Apple recently appointed former Tesla engineering chief Doug Field to oversee the operation of the division, which has more than 5,000 employees.

This division has been working on a self-driving car programme called Project Titan.

Meanwhile, Apple is working on developing core components such as sensors, alongside negotiating with potential suppliers.

In January, Apple cut 200 jobs from its self-driving car division as part of restructuring plans under the new leadership.

Since its establishment, Drive.ai raised $77m from GGV Capital, New Enterprise Associates, Nvidia’s corporate venture arm.

In another development for automated cars, Uber has acquired a self-driving technology company called Mighty AI. Under the deal, 40 employees from Mighty AI’s Seattle office will work at Uber’s Seattle engineering centre.

In Silicon Valley, large companies often acquire struggling startups primarily for their engineers.