Apple intends to nearly double its number of digital marketing staff members, not long after the tech giant upended the advertising industry with recent privacy changes, the Financial Times reported Sept. 4.
The company is bringing 216 ad platform employees on board, which would nearly double the 250 it has on its team and quadruple the number it was hiring in late 2020, according to LinkedIn and Apple careers website data reviewed by the Times. Apple disputed the figures to the newspaper but declined to elaborate.
The job postings come about a year and a half after Apple updated its operating system to allow users to opt out of tracking for ad purposes
David Steinberg, CEO of marketing tech firm Zeta Global, told the Times that Apple was "Machiavellian" and "brilliant" for instituting privacy rules that pressed their rivals to redesign their advertising infrastructure.
"They could build out [their advertising business] dramatically, [and] the 'air cover' is they are protecting the consumer's privacy," Mr. Steinberg told the news outlet.