After leaving as Cisco’s chief technology and strategy officer in September, Padmasree Warrior is joining Chinese electric car startup NextEV as its CEO and chief development officer in the United States.

Warrior was also named to NextEV’s board of directors. She also serves on the boards of Box, Gap Inc., and Microsoft.

The news that Warrior has a new job isn’t that big of a surprise, although the move to the electric automotive sector might be. At last month’s Intel Capital Global Summit, Warrior said she had a new job lined up, but didn’t say it was with NextEV.

NextEV is based in Shanghai and has an office in San Jose, Calif. Like Tesla and other electric vehicle manufacturers, NextEV is looking to blend smart technology and connectivity with software, all of which is right up Warrior’s alley. Prior to Cisco, she served as executive vice president and CTO at Motorola.

NextEV was founded last year by William Li, who is also chairman and CEO of Bitauto Holdings. Martin Leach, who has worked at Ford, Mazda, and Maserati, is NextEV’s president.

While NextEV doesn’t have any electric vehicles available for commercial purchase, it has developed a single-seat car that has raced on the FIA Formula E circuit for electric vehicles.

Former Cisco executives are branching out into new areas of technology. In September, Rob Lloyd was named CEO and board member of HyperLoop Technologies, which is hoping to revolutionize the transportation industry with its high-tech bullet trains.