Apple Dropping Product Design Chief Role, Team to Report to COO Jeff Williams

[ThunderSkunk]

Irked? Try being a designer in another industry. Any other industry. Same skills you have, you can even be the best designer in your entire biz. Enjoy your $45k salary and around the clock work schedule. Hey when you become management of all the hungry new designers hired to replace you, you might even make 60k and live in a slightly nicer reasonably sized one bedroom apartment in Des Moines or Milwaukee. See if what irks you then is still not getting the status symbol of a position title. If you lucked out and are a designer getting paid multiples of what everyone else in your entire career is, you already won the jackpot, take the $. But you’re complaining to the wind. Complain enough and “we’ll just have China design it like we have them engineer, MFG and distribute it. Design services are just another 20k flat fee per project & it always gets done on schedule, w/ as many revisions as we can pack in the timeline & without any prima donna antics.” etc. Just bc Jony Ive confused I.D. with Fashion Design & tried to elevate himself to a pop culture icon doesn’t mean everyone else in design is headed for celebrity. Ridiculous.

 

[blcamp]

This may come across as over-the-top and I'm not trying to be. But this is a really bad, game-changing decision if it's a permanent thing.

There needs to be a design czar at Apple... regardless of what rank (executive level or not) they may hold. Otherwise they will devolve into just another company, and eventually die, or come close to it... again.

I say that not just as a user or customer - I am also (as I'm sure many others on MR are as well) a shareholder. I don't have much sway with my small holding (only 3 figures), but I can still tell you I am pissed about this decision. The change in priorities has the potential to send it into a spiral at some point. I hope they reconsider.

 

[msackey]

Is this a good thing? I don’t think so.

I was wondering about that too. It seems like they need a dedicated Designer-type in leadership in order to make sure that design considerations are not sidelined by "business" considerations, and when folks say "business" they usually mean bean counting.

 

[atomic.flip]

I loved Jony Ive’s work at his peak. Back when he held to the tenant that design is not just how it looks but how it works. That gave us the brilliance of a home button integrated with touch ID and the iPod click wheel and pinch to zoom touch screens.

But Jony Ive seemed to forget that in his later years at Apple in a quest to remove every port on every device, sacrifice everything for the sake of thinness and pursue high-end fashion to the point of prices that excluded 99% of the first world population.

There was a great statement by John Gruber years ago where he commented that billionaire Bill Gates refused to use an iPhone and that an ordinary guy like Gruber could afford to own a better smartphone than a billionaire was using.

Sure there were third parties doing gold-plated diamond-studded iPhones for insane prices, but Apple was not selling those.

Apple has always had high prices for the highest performance macs. But the first couple of years of Apple Watch Edition were just pretentious — and functionally equivalent to Apple Watch Sport. That was all Ive losing touch with the masses.

And there is a place for nearly port-less MacBook that is ultra-thin but that MacBook should never carry the “Pro” moniker — sacrificing basic functionality like a decent keyboard for the sake of thinness.

I don’t miss the Jony Ive that left Apple or the like-minded designers who have either left Apple with him or complained since his departure. I miss the Jony Ive who believed like Steve Jobs that design is about something works from the inside out.

Actually the Edition Watched and such were not Ive’s work. You can thank a brief hire of a former Burberry executive for that stuff. Won’t name names but you can do the research.

 

[Cuesca]

Apple is great at designing something that gives its user an emotional connection to the device. When people open an Apple product, regardless of how good or bad it is, it's always something premium and special. For me even if I view their design as on the decline since the iPhone X, they are still one of the best if not the best.

 

[UltimateSyn]

The fact that you don't understand why the Apple Watch Edition was ceramic, or why the MacBook Retina was designed that way says a lot about you (and those like you) and also why Apple didn't need Ive anymore.
Now you have a ridiculous Apple Watch Hermes that costs twice as much as a Ceramic Edition, and it's a trivial Steel Watch, and an iPad Pro that costs three times as much as a portable Mac, weighs twice as much, and still remains a tablet without MacOS.
But you are too smart to understand it.

That's why Apple has increased its income tenfold and is careful not to make a watch that is worth something (no really, say that the Ultra is worth something) or putting macOS on an iPad.
I recommend, keep buying, Apple investors are happy about it.

I'm not really sure what you were trying to say in your post, but... the original Apple Watch Edition was 18k gold and cost $15,000. It was a dumb product, and nobody bought it after the first two weeks. The Retina MacBook had a catastrophic keyboard design for the sake of thinness that resulted in a lawsuit and many thousands of ticked off customers.

 

[UMHurricanes34]

Apple has now fully moved into the post-Jobs era.

Design is not an operations activity. It's a strategic asset. It's product planning beyond what the finance forecasters are comfortable seeing. Product roadmaps. Looking to where technology is headed, and designing solutions before we get there.

This is really terrible news for Apple. They will be relegated to "follower" status and no longer leaders. Having no vision means you're blind to opportunity.

Completely agree. I would argue Apple shifted away from leader to follower years ago. The company has been clearly lacking in vision as seen by its meandering and extremely incremental strategy to product updates over the last decade. They’ve always been bad at multitasking, but all ties to the previous design-centric approach are now entirely broken and none of the products are being meaningfully pushed forward. Just thinner and different shaped slabs of aluminum. Bean counters now indeed fully run the show.

 

[tubular]

Although it got rough toward the end, I think Sir Jony Ive generally fought for the user by fighting for usability and human factors. I do wonder who's fighting for the user now.

 

[femike]

It will be designed by committee. The bean counters will have even more say, if that is possible, in the approval process.

 

[19callum93]

Does this mean we could see more creativity?

 

[User 6502]

Makes sense. Apple stopped designing products a long time ago. They don’t need a product design chief anymore.

 

[Doomtomb]

Only so many way to design a rectangle with rounded corners

 

[Alexwastaken]

Bring back Jony

 

[rulymammoth]

I don't know, the biggest hardware problems Apple had in recent years were when they leaned too far into design driven products where everything else took a back seat and Ives ran roughshod over usability/ergonomics and reliability. Even on the software side a lot of the UI changes that make it a flatter, less easily differentiable UI, across Apple's OSes where driven by the same problem. The new MBPs and such, like the one I'm typing this on, are the rejection of that, they still have great design but the design informs the process, it doesnt drive it, so the more industrial slightly chunkier machines fix a lot of the frustrations folks had with previous machines.

So overall I think this is a good thing. Impressive design is not the same as good engineering or UI/UX work, and the first should inform the rest, not drive the bus.

Finally a voice of reason stands out amongst the riff raff on this thread. I love all these comments from people making snap judgments when they have ZERO clue what's actually happening internally at Apple.

We can all agree that Apple abso-freakin'-lutely put form far too much above function in most of the past decade. Macs are the perfect example. The latest Macs are functionally so much more in line with what users want/need. My M2 MBA is a work of art and all the power I need. The chassis is beautiful. It just all works wonderfully.

 

[Apple Knowledge Navigator]

Not gonna lie, if this is true (bearing in mind that Gurman once again has spewed nothing but conjecture, dressed up as factual information), it actually may not be a bad move.

For years people have been clamouring for more functional devices, and now we finally have some. And there actually aren’t too many valid complaints.

The MacBook Pro notch? It disappears during use and was an inevitable consequence of having ultra-thin bezels.

Non-upgradeable RAM? No it’s not a conspiracy, it’s part of the Apple silicon DNA and what helps to make Macs so responsive.

Boring designs? A productivity machine isn’t supposed to be put on a pedestal, it’s a workhorse.

That is the purpose after all, the value for money comes from the function. And for me the best example of the post-Ive era is Mac Studio.

Mac Studio is the computer everyone was asking for for years - a mid range Mac that’s powerful but compact, omitting internal expansion for those who don’t need it.

First we had the G4 Cube which, if we’re being honest, was ahead of its time in concept, and failed more or less due to its unreasonable price and a user base who wasn’t ready to ditch a tower.

Then you had the trashcan Mac Pro which was Ive’s answer to this, and the outcome was inevitable - a product that was technically constrained all for the sake of aesthetic. It’s all very well for people to look back and say “It was amazing!”… Uh, was it an amazing product?

The Studio on the other hand is the polar opposite to these, lacking radical aesthetics but ultimately understated and performance that’s fully unconstrained with room to grow. It’s a true work machine, even featuring ports on the front.

Form and function rarely work hand in hand for any company, which is why it’s all the more special when it does. Ive’s best work was when Jobs was around and they complimented each others talents, but the problem during the post-Jobs era was that he became too self-absorbed and was clearly distracted by his own wishes to move out of reimagining the same classes of device over and over and over. The trashcan Mac Pro was the ultimate example of this.

So no I’m not afraid for Apple’s future, I believe that the company is coming to terms with the fact that several of its product lines are now beyond matured. The upcoming AR/VR headset will provide a good indication of how they could innovate going forward.

 

[jaw04005]

Errr, no. As far as we know, products such as the previous MBPs (e.g. unreliable keyboards with basically no travel) and the trash can Mac (poor cooling) had design flaws due to limitations caused by aesthetic design decisions. Function really needs to come before form. Think latest generation MBPs. They may look pretty dull but that keyboard is leagues ahead of the previous one.

Apple designed products for years that were both functional and design forward. They're not mutually exclusive. You need teams on both sides.

Jeff Williams has been the C suite executive that's been in charge of the design team since Ive left. It doesn't surprise me to see Hankey's managers report to him, for now.

That's typically what happens in a company when there's no-one internally to fill a position. The position's boss takes over the role until a suitable replacement can be found.

Bring back Jony

He's building noses.

Jony Ive has designed a “magically transforming” Red Nose

The transforming Red Nose is available to buy today.

www.theverge.com

 

[Nicole1980]

Only so many way to design a rectangle with rounded corners

This is the best comment here, 6 pages in. Apple product design was settled a long time ago, more or less. They stick to a few design tenets that they established years ago, and thats all they really need to do

 

[triton100]

I think that Jony Ive (and his team) had an ability to design timeless products with superior build quality in a world focused on churning cheap forgettable plastic products. Just take the 27" iMac. The design has remained largely unchanged for 10/15 years, yet it still looks more elegant today than any competing products.

Agreed but it’s easy to do that when you compromise form over function.

 

[SmugMaverick]

Bean counter in charge of design 😂😂

Here comes the utter nonsense designs.

 

[BC2009]

The fact that you don't understand why the Apple Watch Edition was ceramic, or why the MacBook Retina was designed that way says a lot about you (and those like you) and also why Apple didn't need Ive anymore.
Now you have a ridiculous Apple Watch Hermes that costs twice as much as a Ceramic Edition, and it's a trivial Steel Watch, and an iPad Pro that costs three times as much as a portable Mac, weighs twice as much, and still remains a tablet without MacOS.
But you are too smart to understand it.

That's why Apple has increased its income tenfold and is careful not to make a watch that is worth something (no really, say that the Ultra is worth something) or putting macOS on an iPad.
I recommend, keep buying, Apple investors are happy about it.

I am smart enough to know that the first Apple Watch Edition did not come in ceramic — it came in gold (not gold finish). It cost between $10K and $20K and was gifted to several celebrities so they would wear them.

https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2014/09/09Apple-Unveils-Apple-Watch-Apples-Most-Personal-Device-Ever/

Further, I said there was a place for a thin portless MacBook — just not a MacBook Pro.

So whatever you think says a lot about me and those like me may not mean what you think it means.

Before you go dismissing people’s opinions, educate yourself. Apparently, you are the one who lacks understanding.

For the record, the ceramic Apple Watch Edition was the first reasonable variant of it.

 

[jaw04005]

Bean counter in charge of design 😂😂

Here comes the utter nonsense designs.

He's been with Apple since Jobs returned. He's not a bean counter. Apple's lucky they have a COO who's an actual engineer.

By the way, he spearheaded engineering development of Apple Watch. That product has been his baby since the beginning. It seems to be doing pretty well for an accessory.

 

[Motionblurrr]

Apple is great at designing something that gives its user an emotional connection to the device. When people open an Apple product, regardless of how good or bad it is, it's always something premium and special. For me even if I view their design as on the decline since the iPhone X, they are still one of the best if not the best.

I believe the XS generation was the last generation Jony Ive touched. Which is definitely true because the X and XS line was gorgeous. Clean.

 

[Mrkevinfinnerty]

"Plonk another A15 in it Jeff... "

 

[NMBob]

This could save them a bundle coupled with the software design chief engineer they must have gotten rid of a while back.

 

[hybrid_x]

We never had large design teams at NeXT nor later at Apple. That team was post iPod/iPhone/iPad introduction years when Steve was becoming more ill.

They created the SVP role to keep Ives around. The team that does the work will now report more directly with Engineering as it used to do.

Apple previously relied on outside industrial design shops for a lot of product concept and production design. Apple designed the software internally, but the external design was done by outside shops like frogdesign until the early 1990s when Robert Brunner was their head of design, and Jony Ive started and worked his way up. At NeXT, Jobs also outsourced the industrial design. He always valued design, and only moved that capability in house once it was a clear competitive advantage.