Apple’s Design Executive Alan Dye, who led the company’s user interface team for the past decade, is leaving to join Meta, Bloomberg reported. Dye will play a central role in enhancing AI features for Meta’s consumer devices, including smart glasses and virtual reality headsets, reporting directly to Chief Technology Officer Andrew Bosworth. At Apple, he will be succeeded by Steve Lemay, described by Apple CEO Tim Cook as having “a key role in the design of every major Apple interface since 1999.”
Meta has actively recruited talent from competitors, including hires from OpenAI, to strengthen its position in the AI and consumer technology space. Following Dye’s appointment, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced a new creative studio within Reality Labs that Dye will lead, joined by former Apple designers Billy Sorrentino and Joshua To, as well as Meta’s industrial design and metaverse art teams.
Zuckerberg said the studio would “bring together design, fashion, and technology to define the next generation of our products and experiences.” He added on Threads, “Our idea is to treat intelligence as a new design material and imagine what becomes possible when it is abundant, capable, and human-centered.”