Is Apple becoming less of a design company?

Apple Inc, globally renowned for their cutting-edge aesthetics and treatment of design as religion, may suddenly becoming less of a design driven company. You can say that Steve Jobs was almost design obsessed and that defined Apple. However, that is changing. Now, Apple will not hire a replacement for Evans Hankey, their vice president of iPhone industrial designs. Instead, the company’s core industrial designing group, comprising of 20-odd design driven individuals, will directly report to Apple COO Jeff Williams.

Prior to Hankey, Jony Ive was the leading industrial designer, who had joined the company around the time Steve Jobs returned on board. Ive was responsible for a most of Apple’s famed design features like translucent cases on iMac, clean lines etc. Since the death of Steve Jobs, Apple has seen a steady spree of exits from various departments, since the new management does not resonate with the founding principle; “Think Different”. Jony Ive quit Apple in 2019 to start his own design and consulting firm called LoveFrom.

Many creative minds have resigned, and the remaining designers including Molly Anderson, Duncan Kerr, Bart Andre and Ben Shaffer will be part of the group that will report directly to the COO as part of the shift. This move get the Operations team much closer with the Design team; a move that had irked creative staffers in the past. 

This could elevate Williams hierarchically as a possible successor to Tim Cook for the corner office. One thing is clear, if design becomes secondary, Apple may not be the Apple that Steve Jobs conceived and nurtured.