Apple Moves Designer Whiz Jony Ive Into C-Suite

Apple (AAPL) has seen fit to up Jony Ive, its longtime design senior vice president, to Chief Design Officer, a newly-created position that delivers the iconic executive to the vendor’s C-suite.

In his new role, Ive, who’s widely credited with Apple’s innovative industrial design, will focus more on actual design as his administrative duties will be absorbed by two new lieutenants–Richard Howarth, now the vendor’s Industrial Design head and Alan Dye, its new User Interface lead.

Ive will oversee both Industrial Design and User Interface and handle retail store design for the vendor’s network of Apple Stores worldwide. And, he’s got his hand in the design of Apple’s new campus as well.

Ive told the U.K.’s Telegraph, which first reported his, Dye’s and Howarth’s promotions, the change in roles will free him from day-to-day administrative duties and enable him to spend time at other Apple locations, including Campus 2, the vendor’s under-construction, so-called “spaceship” facility in which he is heavily involved.

“I’m still in charge of both,” Ive told the Telegraph. “I am called Chief Design Officer. Having Alan and Richard in place frees me up from some of the administrative and management work…” he said.

“Richard was lead on the iPhone from the start. He saw it all the way through from prototypes to the first model we released. Alan has a genius for human interface design. So much of the Apple Watch’s operating system came from him,” said Ive.

Apple chief executive Tim Cook told employees of the new promotions in a memo to employees, 9to5Mac reported. Here’s Cook’s message:

Team,
I have exciting news to share with you today. I am happy to announce that Jony Ive is being promoted to the newly created position of Chief Design Officer at Apple.

Jony is one of the most talented and accomplished designers of his generation, with an astonishing 5,000 design and utility patents to his name. His new role is a reflection of the scope of work he has been doing at Apple for some time. Jony’s design responsibilities have expanded from hardware and, more recently, software UI to the look and feel of Apple retail stores, our new campus in Cupertino, product packaging and many other parts of our company.

Design is one of the most important ways we communicate with our customers, and our reputation for world-class design differentiates Apple from every other company in the world. As Chief Design Officer, Jony will remain responsible for all of our design, focusing entirely on current design projects, new ideas and future initiatives. On July 1, he will hand off his day-to-day managerial responsibilities of ID and UI to Richard Howarth, our new vice president of Industrial Design, and Alan Dye, our new vice president of User Interface Design.

Richard, Alan and Jony have been working together as colleagues and friends for many years. Richard has been a member of the Design team for two decades, and in that time he has been a key contributor to the design of each generation of iPhone, Mac, and practically every other Apple product. Alan started at Apple nine years ago on the Marcom team, and helped Jony build the UI team which collaborated with ID, Software Engineering and countless other groups on groundbreaking projects like iOS 7, iOS 8 and Apple Watch.

Please join me in congratulating these three exceptionally talented designers on their new roles at Apple.

Tim