Alan Dye, the design executive who led Apple’s user interface team for the past 10 years, is leaving the company to join Meta, Bloomberg’s Mark Garman reports.
This is an important hire for Meta, as the company is pushing consumer devices such as smart glasses and virtual reality headsets. Dye will focus on improving the AI capabilities of these devices and will report directly to Chief Technology Officer Andrew Bosworth.
Dai will be replaced at Apple by Steve LeMay, who has “played a key role in designing every major Apple interface since 1999,” Apple CEO Tim Cook said in a statement to Bloomberg.
Meta also poached researchers from OpenAI this summer and appears to be hiring from competitors to help the company compete in the AI race. (Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg reportedly handed out homemade soup to OpenAI employees as part of a recruiting drive, and OpenAI Chief Research Officer Mark Cheng has since said he delivers his own soup to promising Meta recruits.)
Shortly after news of Dai’s departure broke, Zuckerberg announced that he would create a new creative studio within Reality Labs, which Dai would lead. They’ll be joined there by Billy Sorrentino, another former Apple designer who led interface design across Reality Labs. Joshua To led interface design across Reality Labs. Meta’s industrial design team led by Pete Bristol. and its Metaverse design and art team, led by Jason Rubin.
Zuckerberg said the studio will “bring together design, fashion and technology to define the next generation of products and experiences.”
“Our idea is to treat intelligence as a new design material and imagine what is possible when it becomes rich, capable, and human-centric,” Meta’s CEO wrote in Threads. “We will elevate design within Meta and bring together a talented group that combines technology, creative vision, systems thinking, and deep experience building iconic products that bridge hardware and software.”
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This article was updated after publication to include additional information about Meta’s plans.
