The man who created the iPod reveals the moment he and his wife decided to leave Apple
Fadell was a key member of the team behind the iPod, and was hired to lead production of the device. His wife, Danielle Lambert, also worked at Apple but in human resources.
In 2010, Fadell and his wife left Apple. He told The Guardian that it was because of the effect that his job was having on his son.
"One day we came home together and our son was crying," he told The Guardian. "Like really, really upset. So my wife runs to console him and he pushes her away and goes to the nanny. When that happened, it was like, 'What are we doing here? Who's truly the parent?' It's a big deal. You don't get those years back."
However, that may not be the only reason that Fadell decided to leave Apple. A book published in 2014 claimed that Fadell's departure was due to a falling out with Jony Ive, Apple's head of design. In the book, a source told the author, Leander Kahney:
Tony got canned ... He was paid off with his salary for a number of years plus so many millions to leave. Tony was canned because he was battling with Jony. He went to Steve so many times bitching about Jony, but Steve had such a tremendous amount of respect for Jony and their relationship that he sided with Jony not Tony.
Fadell went on to start Nest, the hardware company that makes connected "internet of things" devices such as thermostats, security cameras and smoke detectors. But Fadell doesn't think that everything in your home needs to be connected to the internet. "Oh, just because something can be connected doesn't mean it should be," he said.