One Of Apple's Key Designers Is Out As Jony Ive Gets More Power
Mike Nudelman/Business Insider
Mark Gurman of 9to5Mac reports that Apple's Human Interface Vice President Greg Christie will soon be leaving the company. Gurman, citing internal Apple sources, writes that Jony Ive, Apple's VP in charge of design, will soon helm all of Apple's software design efforts.
Christie currently reports directly to Apple's Craig Federighi, senior vice president of software engineering, but Ive will soon take the lead in managing the company's design team.
Sources have reportedly told Gurman that this shakeup has resulted from a falling out between Ive and Christie. The two reportedly clashed over creative direction when Ive tasked Apple's Human Interface team with designing iOS 7.
iOS 7 signified a major design change for Apple's mobile software compared to previous versions. The overall operating system now sports a much flatter design than its former iterations, and Apple has added a new Control Center menu for quickly managing settings. It feels like a completely new environ emt compared to older editions of iOS.
The shakeup comes just before Apple's World Wide Developer Conference in June, where the company is likely to reveal iOS 8 and its next-generation desktop software, Mac OS X 10.10.
We've reached out to Apple for comment and will update if we hear back.