The CEO of Opeli Sam Altman appears on the screen during a conversation with the president of Microsoft and the general director of Nadella's saty at Microsoft Build 2025, a conference at Seattle, Washington, May 19, 2025.
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Opeli said on Wednesday that he was buying a startup ions Ive AI devices for around $ 6.4 billion in the contract with all Equita, which includes its current participation in the company.
Ive accepts “deep creative and design duties throughout the OpenAI and IO,” said Opeli in a statement. The company said that IO is connected with Opeli, while Ive and its “creative collective” called Lovefrom will remain independent.
IN Blog post On Wednesday, from the OpenAI Director General, Altman and Ive, the couple said that IO was founded a year ago by Ive, along with Apple Scott Cannon graduates, Tang Tan and Evans Hankey, who briefly took over the role of Ive in Apple after his departure.
“The IO team, focused on developing products that inspire, strengthen and turn on, will now connect with OpenAI to cooperate more accurately with research teams, engineering and products in San Francisco,” said post.
Opeli said he pays $ 5 billion, taking into account that he is already the owner of 23% of the company.
The purchase is by far the largest and appears a few weeks after the company agreed to buy a coding tool supported by AI Windsurfing for $ 3 billion. Earlier, the Analytics base company purchased Openai Stone For an undisclosed sum in 2024.
In 2019, he announced that he was leaving Applewhere he was a long -term project director to start Lovefrom. Said Airbnb in 2020 It was Ive that I consulted with the company on employment and future products. The New York Times Reported Last year, Lovefrom customers pay the company up to $ 200 million a year, and its designers at that time worked on projects for Christie, Airbnb and Ferrarri.
Lovefrom says on his website that he was founded by Ive and the designer of Marc Newson, but he says nothing about what the company does or contains no mention of IO.
The design director of Apple Jons Ive (L) and CEO of Apple Tim Cook check the new iPhone XR during a special Apple event at Steve Jobs Theater on September 12, 2018 at Cupertino, California.
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Ive is responsible for design AppleThe most iconic products, including iPod, iPhone, iPad and MacBook Air. He also helped design the new headquarters of Cupertino Apple, called Apple Park, a project that began in 2004 and the campus officially opened in 2019.
The news of the takeover appears as OpenAI, which has recently been valued at $ 300 billion in Funding round Headed by Softbank, is in a hurry in advance in the AI ​​generative race, in which players, including GoogleAnthropic and Elon Musk's XAI invests strongly and regularly implementing new products. The part of his hardware operations is part of being in this race.
In order to increase hardware ambitions, OpenAI hired former boss Finish Orion extended eyeglass initiative in November to conduct robotic and consumer activities. Caitlin “CK” Kalinowski wrote in the announcement in the time that the role “initially focuses on the work of OpenAi robotics and partnerships to help introduce artificial intelligence in the physical world and unlock its benefits for humanity.”
Also at the end of last year, Opeli has invested in physical intelligenceRobot startup based in San Francisco, which raised $ 400 million with a valuation of $ 2.4 billion. Including other investors Amazon Founder Jeff Bezos. The startup focuses on “introducing general artificial intelligence to the physical world”, according to its website, by developing large AI models and power robots algorithms.
TO WATCH: Ive and Altman connect
