SAN FRANCISCO – Jony Ive, the creative force behind the design of Apple’s iPhone, has been appointed by OpenAI to spearhead a new hardware initiative for the AI company responsible for ChatGPT.

OpenAI said it is acquiring io, a product and engineering company co-founded by Ive, in a deal valued at nearly $6.5 billion.

OpenAI said its CEO Sam Altman had been “quietly” collaborating since 2023 with Ive and his design firm, LoveFrom.

Having spent more than twenty years at Apple, Ive is celebrated for his significant contributions to the design of the iPhone, iMac, and iPad. Prior to his departure in 2019 to establish his own design enterprise, he served as Apple’s chief design officer.

On Wednesday, in a collaborative announcement on OpenAI’s website, Ive and Altman expressed that they realized achieving their vision to design, build, and produce a novel range of products necessitates the creation of a new company.

That’s when Ive co-founded io with Scott Cannon, Evans Hankey and Tang Tan.

OpenAI said Ive will not become an OpenAI employee and his design collective, LoveFrom, will remain independent but “will assume deep design and creative responsibilities across OpenAI and io.” Both OpenAI and Ive’s design firm are based in San Francisco.

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