All posts tagged: Jony

Jony Ive and Sam Altman say they finally have an AI hardware prototype

Jony Ive and Sam Altman say they finally have an AI hardware prototype

Published by Webster

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and former Apple designer Jony Ive have been keeping the finer details of the first mysterious OpenAI hardware under wraps, but it sounds like they’ve settled on a design. In an interview with Laurene Powell Jobs at Emerson Collective’s 2025 Demo Day, they said they are currently prototyping the device, and when asked about a timeframe, Ive said it could arrive in “less than” two years. Altman described the design as “simple and beautiful and playful,” adding that, “There was an earlier prototype that we were quite excited about, but I did not have any feeling of, ‘I want to pick up that thing and take a bite out of it,’ and then finally we got there all of a sudden.” Ive similarly emphasized simplicity and whimsy, saying, “I love solutions that teeter on appearing almost naive in their simplicity, and I also love incredibly intelligent, sophisticated products that you want to touch, and you feel no intimidation, and you want to use almost carelessly, that you use them almost without …

OpenAI and Jony Ive are building a ChatGPT-powered super-gadget

OpenAI and Jony Ive are building a ChatGPT-powered super-gadget

Published by Webster

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. On this episode of The Vergecast, Nilay and David are joined by The Verge’s Alex Heath to talk through all the things we know, kind of know, and don’t know at all about what io is up to. There’s some interesting reporting on the notion of the device as a companion to your phone and laptop, some connections to the original iPod Shuffle, and still a lot of questions about how this will work and whether you’ll want it. We won’t see this device for a while, but don’t worry — we’ll surely keep talking about it. Finally, in the lightning round, it’s time for another edition of Brendan Carr is a Dummy, …

What in the world are Jony Ive and Sam Altman building?

What in the world are Jony Ive and Sam Altman building?

Published by Webster

The last 48 hours have been a wild rollercoaster ride for AI hardware. On Tuesday, Google ended its I/O keynote — a roughly two-hour event with copious references to AI — with its vision for Android XR glasses. That included flashy partnerships with Gentle Monster and Warby Parker, as well as the first hands-on opportunity with its prototype glasses for the developers and the majority of tech media alike. On the ground, it was among the buzziest things to come out of Google I/O — a glimpse of what Big Tech thinks is the winning AI hardware formula. A day later, Jony Ive and Sam Altman kicked down the door and told Google, “Hold my beer.” If you’ve somehow missed the headlines, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman revealed that the company was buying Ive’s AI hardware startup for $6.5 billion. That alone was enough to set the tech media sphere ablaze. After all, Ive is the legendary figure behind the iPhone and Apple Watch’s iconic design, revered for his relationship to Steve Jobs. Altman is not …

Details leak about Jony Ive’s new ‘screen-free’ OpenAI device

Details leak about Jony Ive’s new ‘screen-free’ OpenAI device

Published by Webster

Altman suggested that the acquisition could increase OpenAI’s value by $1 trillion, and envisioned a “family of devices” being born from the partnership. Information about the first device, which Altman is aiming to release by late 2026, has been kept tightly under wraps since its development was confirmed last year over concerns that competitors will set about trying to copy the product before it’s launched to the public. Altman dropped some hints during the call that shape our expectations, however, including that it will be unobtrusive, fully aware of a user’s life and surroundings, and will serve as a “third core device” a person would put on a desk after a MacBook Pro and an iPhone. OpenAI is already predicting that the device will be popular, with Altman saying that it will ship “faster than any company has ever shipped 100 million of something new before.” Altman told OpenAI employees on the call that they have “the chance to do the biggest thing we’ve ever done as a company here.” The Journal reports that Ive …

Jony Ive says Rabbit and Humane made bad products

Jony Ive says Rabbit and Humane made bad products

Published by Webster

There have been public failures as well, such as the Humane AI Pin and the Rabbit R1 personal assistant device. “Those were very poor products,” said Ive, 58. “There has been an absence of new ways of thinking expressed in products.” Our initial reviews certainly backed up Ive’s impression, as David Pierce said the Pin “doesn’t work,” and called the R1 “a worse and less functional version of your smartphone.” Humane, which, like io, was lead by former Apple employees, has already disappeared into the mist of an acquihire by HP and shut down all AI Pins in February. The Rabbit R1 is still going, even if its “large action model” hype and momentum appear to have dissipated. Earlier this month, the company added a memory log that can help its AI assistant have context for interactions. It’s also offering a free a free trial of Intern, its “upgraded AI-native operating system that coordinates multiple agents to get things done,” even if you don’t own an R1, as it continues to work on rabbitOS 2.0. …

OpenAI is buying Jony Ive’s AI hardware company

OpenAI is buying Jony Ive’s AI hardware company

Published by Webster

OpenAI is buying io, a hardware company founded by former Apple design chief Jony Ive and several other former engineers from his time there, including Scott Cannon, Evans Hankey, and Tang Tan. Ive won’t be joining OpenAI, and his design firm, LoveFrom, will continue to be independent, but they will “take over design for all of OpenAI, including its software,” in a deal valued at nearly $6.5 billion, Bloomberg reports. About 55 hardware engineers, software developers, and manufacturing experts will join OpenAI as part of the acquisition. That includes Cannon, Hankey, and Tan. The first devices following the acquisition are set to launch in 2026. In an interview with Bloomberg, Ive called AI hardware misfires like the Humane Pin and Rabbit R1, “very poor products,” and said that “There has been an absence of new ways of thinking expressed in products.” “We gathered together the best hardware and software engineers, the best technologists, physicists, scientists, researchers and experts in product development and manufacturing,” Ive and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said in a joint post. “Many …

Jony Ive confirms he’s working on a new device with OpenAI

Published by Webster

There aren’t a lot of details. He met Altman through Brian Chesky, CEO of Airbnb, and the project is being funded by Ive and the Emerson Collective, Laurene Powell Jobs company. The New York Times claims it could raise $1 billion in funding by the end of the year. There was no mention of Masayoshi Son, the SoftBank CEO rumored last year to have invested a $1 billion in the project. The project only has 10 employees currently, but they include Tang Tan and Evans Hankey, two key people who worked with Ive on the iPhone. As for the device itself? Last year it was rumored to be inspired by touchscreen technology and the original iPhone, which makes sense given Tan and Hankey’s involvement. There’s still no timeline on when we’ll learn more about this project, but the little information dropped in the New York Times sound very familiar to anyone following the AI hardware scene in the last year: Mr. Altman and Mr. Ive talked about how generative A.I. made it possible to create …

Jony Ive imagined the Vision Pro giving you Zoom eyes and sunglasses

Published by Webster

A new patent granted to Apple details how the company is thinking of using the Vision Pro’s external display to show what the wearer is looking at inside the device. The patent, which includes Jony Ive as an inventor, details ways an outside screen on a generic head-mounted display could be used to indicate what the wearer is seeing to people around them. While the patent isn’t specifically about the Vision Pro and its “EyeSight” display feature, it’s clear that some of the ideas here informed the features in the final headset. For example, Apple has talked publicly about how the outer screen on the Vision Pro can let outsiders see the eyes of the person wearing the headset or display a colorful pattern that indicates the wearer is fully immersed in VR. But pictures in the patent detail how an external display could be used for a few sillier-looking applications, like displaying the weather, sunglasses on your face, a DO NOT DISTURB sign, or even replacing the wearer’s eyes with Zoom icons. As fun …