Jony Ive's career was mainly at Apple, designing products like the iPhone and Mac. Now he'll work at OpenAI, which bought his AI device startup io.

OpenAI is acquiring Jony Ive and Sam Altman's startup, io, which will lead creative and design work for OpenAI.

OpenAI forms a new hardware division with the io team, led by Jony Ive, to develop AI-native devices, possibly launching a voice-first product as early as 2026.

The all-stock deal with OpenAI values Ive’s AI hardware startup io at $6.5 billion—and is set to be a major windfall for the man who designed the iPhone.

Jony Ive became renowned for a meticulous design aesthetic that shaped the cultural zeitgeist during a 27-year career at Apple, which he left in 2019.

Here’s what we know: it’s probably not smart glasses. Beyond that, we don’t know much about what Jony Ive and OpenAI are building through their newly combined company io, except that it’s some kind of AI super-gadget. But after a couple of years of watching the industry try and shove AI into every form factor you can imagine, we have some guesses.

Altman and Ive announced OpenAI’s acquisition of Ive’s io in a statement Wednesday, with the deal valued at roughly $6.5 billion after OpenAI acquired 23% of io in a partnership deal in 2024.

I really hope OpenAI's new hardware doesn't make me talk to myself in public.

With Ive leading design, OpenAI aims to pair the tech behind its ChatGPT chatbot with product design expertise that made the iPhone a bestseller.

A day later, Jony Ive and Sam Altman kicked down the door and told Google, “Hold my beer.”

Did Sam Altman just figure out what AI's been missing? Or did he get locked into the very thinking he's spent his career avoiding?