Former Apple Retail Boss in Gadget Delivery Service Startup

Ron Johnson, the former Apple (AAPL) retail boss credited with architecting the vendor’s store strategy, is launching a new “high-end, on-demand delivery service for gadgets,” according to a report in The Information.

Johnson is said to already have recruited a number of ex-Apple employees, including one-time Apple Executive Vice President Jerry McDougal, to join in the startup. Johnson left Apple in November 2011 for the top spot at department store retailer J.C. Penny (JCP) but was ousted after only 18 months at the helm.

There was some following talk that Johnson might return to Apple for his old job, which was vacant for the better part of two years after the vendor showed John Browett, Johnson’s replacement, the door. Apple hired Angela Ahrendts away from U.K. fashion house Burberry in October, 2013 to run its retail operation and she came on board seven months later to much subsequent acclaim.

At this point, details on Johnson’s startup are sparse but the service apparently involves sending out branded, environmentally friendly vans on deliveries for buyers on demand. In other words, you buy, we fly—or drive, as it were—immediately.

The Information described Johnson’s venture as “Best Buy’s Geek Squad meets Apple’s Genius Bar,” according to BusinessWeek, while the Next Web pegged it as a “combination of Apple’s Online Store and FedEx.”

So far, there’s no drone talk, which quite possibly is a good thing. There are comparisons being made to Uber, which itself is fiddling with rapid deliveries of food orders.

Johnson recently discussed challenges startups face with getting products in front of customers in an Andreessen Horowitz podcast. Via 9to5Mac, this is part of what he said:

In today’s world, which is multichannel, unfortunately we’re in a period where stores will become increasingly less important in the total distribution mix. The world is moving online. It’s moving online more rapidly than I think a lot of us imagined, a lot more than I did, and so the challenge for a startup is, given that physical retail is expensive and knowing that it’ll be less important to your mix long term, what’s the right mix? How does it compliment your brand, and what’s the role of that in your mix?

Perhaps Johnson’s new venture is geared to addressing those issues. Whatever it is could appear early next year, according to reports.