Paul Meade, Apple’s vice president in charge of the Vision Pro headset, is leaving the company to join OpenAI’s hardware team, according to Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman.
It is known that Meade also led the development of AI-based smart glasses that Apple will release next year. The expensive Vision Pro wasn’t a hit, but Apple is hoping its cheaper smart glasses will help it compete with Meta’s wearable devices.
Gurman frames these resignations as a byproduct of John Ternus’ impending elevation to Apple CEO and Ternus’ decision to reorganize the hardware engineering team, which left some of the company’s vice presidents feeling like they had been demoted.
Meanwhile, OpenAI is already working with Apple’s former chief design officer Jony Ive on an AI device that CEO Sam Altman claims will be more peaceful and calming than the iPhone. But a report last fall found that OpenAI was struggling to get the details right.
TechCrunch has reached out to Apple and OpenAI for comment.
