Jony Ive, known for his pivotal role in the design of iconic products like the iPhone, has confirmed that he is working with OpenAI CEO Sam Altman on a hardware project focused on artificial intelligence and ChatGPT. The news was revealed in a recent New York Times story about Ive, nearly a year after the two were first rumored to be collaborating. Details about the project remain scarce. Ive reportedly met Altman through Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky, and the venture is being funded by Ive and Laurene Powell Jobs’ company Emerson Collective. The Times suggests the project could raise up to $1 billion in funding by the end of the year, but makes no mention of SoftBank CEO Masayoshi Son, who was rumored to have invested $1 billion in the project last year.
The team currently has just 10 employees, but it includes key figures such as Tang Tan and Evans Hankey, who worked closely with Ive on the iPhone. Ive’s company LoveFrom is leading the design of the device. The team operates out of a 35,000-square-foot office in San Francisco, part of a $90 million block of real estate Ive purchased in the city. As for the device itself, the Times reports that Ive and Altman discussed how generative AI could enable a new type of computing device, one that could offer users more functionality than traditional software by handling complex requests. Last year, there were rumors that the device could be inspired by touchscreen technology and the original iPhone.