UI design chief exits Apple to head up Meta’s new design studio

Macworld

Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman reports that a key Apple executive is leaving the company (no, it’s not Tim Cook). Alan Dye, who leads Apple’s user interface design team, is leaving Apple Park in Cupertino for the Ravenswood Slough in Menlo Park and the headquarters of Meta, where he will lead “a new design studio,” said Gurman, and will be “in charge of design for hardware, software and AI integration for its interfaces.”

Dye has led Apple’s user interface design team since 2015. He will be replaced by Steve Lemay, who “has played a key role in the design of every major Apple interface since 1999,” Apple CEO Tim Cook said in a statement to Bloomberg. “He has always set an extraordinarily high bar for excellence and embodies Apple’s culture of collaboration and creativity.”

Dye played a key role in several recent product rollouts for Apple. He led the efforts for the UI redesign in the version 26 operating systems, as well as with the Apple Vision Pro, Apple Watch, and iPhone X. He was one of Jony Ive’s proteges and one of the few designers remaining from that era.

This news follows several reports throughout this year of Meta poaching Apple employees. Several of Apple’s AI development team have left for Meta, including Ruoming Pang, who led Apple’s AI model development. Bloomberg reported that Pang was offered a $200 million compensation package, most of which is stock options.

Earlier this week, Apple announced that AI chief John Giannandrea was “retiring” and renowned AI researcher Amar Subramanya would be taking his place.

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