Openai buys Ki startup from Apple veteran Jony Ive
Openai takes over the Ki-Hhardware startup IO of the former Apple designer Jony Ive for $ 6.4 billion. The deal is intended to enable Openai to get started with hardware development and with IVE brings one of the most influential product designers in tech history on board.
Legendary Apple designer changes to Openai
With the takeover of the Ki-hardware startup IO for around $ 6.4 billion (approx. 5.7 billion euros), the greatest purchase of its company history takes place (via Reuters). With this step, Openaai also gains several top-class ex-Apple managers, including the renowned designer Jony Ive. In addition to IVE, Scott Cannon, Evans Hankey and Tang Tang also join the OPENAI team. Hankey was the successor to Apple until 2023, while Tan was responsible for the product design of the iPhone and the Apple Watch by 2024.
Loud Openaai is now a central role take over in the product design. In his almost 30-year career at Apple, the British designer decisively shaped the design of iconic products such as iMac, iPod, iPhone and iPad. Its minimalist design philosophy as well as the focus on simplicity and functionality are striking for Apple’s success strategy.
What it means to use technology can change fundamentally. I hope we can convey something of the joy, astonishment and the creative spirit that I felt 30 years ago when using an Apple computer. Sam Altman
Devices planned for the Ki era
The first product from the cooperation between Openaai and IO is to be launched in 2026. Ive said that there is an increasing demand for new devices that represent a reaction to the current discomfort with available products. After leaving Apple in 2019, he founded the design company LoveFrome before moving to IO. Openai CEO Sam Altman explained that the new devices are not intended as a replacement for smartphones: “How the smartphone did not replace the laptop, our first product will not replace the smartphone.
It is a completely new type of device.” So far, specific details about the innovative devices are not known. Experts suspect that the hardware could be specially designed in order to support AI applications more efficiently, possibly with new user interfaces that rely more on language or gesture control.
