Jonathan Ive, Apple's long time Senior Vice President of Design and one of the most influential individuals of the ompany, has been named the tech supergiant's first Chief Design Officer. The new position (which was created especially for Ive) will see him shift his responsibilities from Apple's Industrial and Software design units to other tasks within the company. His job description as Chief entails overseeing the design of Apple's retail stores and it's new "spaceship" like corporate headquarters. Ive will still be the overall head of the company's software and hardware design teams however he will be turning over the managerial reigns of the industrial and software design units to new leaders effective July 1st, 2015.
Richard Howarth, a key member of the iPhone design team who has worked on the device since the first generation, will succeed Ive as head industrial design. Ive's promotion will also see Alan Dye, another key Apple employee who was behind the redesign of iOS7, to take the reigns as the new head of user interface.
News of Ive's new promotion first broke today, when The Telegraph published a profile on the Apple design guru written by British comedian Stephen Fry. The claim was later confirmed when popular Apple news blog 9to5Mac published an internal email sent by Apple CEO Tim Cook to his employees.
In the email, Cook stressed the importance of design as one of Apple's core values and said that the company's reputation for "world-class design" is what sets them apart from their competitors.
Since Apple founder Steve Jobs passed away in 2011,Ive along with Cook, has taken over as the public face of the world's most valuable company. Though Ive chooses to remain off stage during Apple's much buzzed about product launches and press conferences, he is still a constant fixture in the company's public image. Much too often doing narrating and appearing in promotional videos where he details the design process behind Apple's many products.
