We just learned the exciting news of legendary Apple designer Jony Ive teaming up with OpenAI and the latter’s CEO Sam Altman.
Now, we have details on the deal, which will see OpenAI acquire Ive’s AI device startup for a cool $6.5 billion US (about $9 billion CAD), according to Bloomberg.
The deal, mostly in OpenAI stock, solidifies a two-year collaboration and signals a major push into consumer AI hardware.
The startup, named io, was quietly launched by Ive and several Apple veterans with the aim of creating a new class of AI-native devices. The acquisition not only secures the talents of Ive and brings in a team of around 55 engineers, designers, and manufacturing experts.
Of the total $6.5 billion US valuation, $5 billion will be paid in equity, with the remainder reflecting OpenAI’s prior 23% stake in io, acquired in late 2024. The company had also invested in io through its startup fund, alongside high-profile backers such as Laurene Powell Jobs’ Emerson Collective, Sutter Hill Ventures, Thrive Capital, Maverick Ventures, and SV Angel.
“I have a growing sense that everything I’ve learned over the last 30 years has led me to this place and to this moment,” Ive said in a joint interview with OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, to Bloomberg. “It’s a relationship and a way of working together that I think is going to yield products and products and products.”
Ive’s new role will see him lead product design not only at io but across all of OpenAI. His LoveFrom design firm will remain independent, continuing existing relationships with clients like Ferrari and Airbnb, but will no longer take on major new projects. The io team will remain based in San Francisco and will continue working alongside OpenAI staff.
Ive co-founded io with ex-Apple execs Scott Cannon, Evans Hankey, and Tang Tan—all of whom are joining OpenAI full-time. Together, they plan to develop a family of devices designed specifically for the age of artificial general intelligence.
AI hardware coming from Ive? That’s exciting stuff and you can bet Apple can’t be happy about this. Apple has struggled with its own AI ambitions, as Apple Intelligence is nothing compared to what we’ve seen from ChatGPT and Google’s Gemini. Siri’s AI update remains delayed.
The AI hardware coming from io is expected sometime in 2026 and will be seen as something completely new. When asked about the AI hardware failures such as the Humane Ai Pin and Rabbit r1, Ive said “those were very poor products.” He added, “There has been an absence of new ways of thinking expressed in products.”
We are not constrained by legacy, said Tan, saying they will get to “rethink this space.” Altman added, “It’s a crazy, ambitious thing to make,” noting, “it will be worth the wait.”
According sources speaking to the Wall Street Journal, Ive and Altman have been working together for two years on the secret project, with hardware option that could headphones and other devices with cameras. These people say the goal is to move people away from screens. The deal still is pending regulatory approval and is expected to close by this summer.
Are you excited for what’s coming from OpenAI and Ive? (TAKE MY MONEY!)
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$6.5B from starting the company in 2019, a nice return in 6 years, more than he would ever made from Apple!
I somehow doubt that Ive/OpenAI collab would “yield products and products and products”… it might generate a few, even a brilliant one or two but probably not that many as Ive says.