Here’s a link to our post on the original, paywalled Wall Street Journal story, in case you haven’t yet seen it.

In response to this story, Tim Cook sent this email to NBC reporter Dylan Byers:

Hi Dylan,

Hope you are well.

The story is absurd. A lot of the reporting, and certainly the conclusions just don’t match with reality. At a base level, it shows a lack of understanding about how the design team works and how Apple works. It distorts relationships, decisions and events to the point that we just don’t recognize the company it claims to describe.

The design team is phenomenally talented. As Jony has said, they’re stronger than ever, and I have complete confidence that they will thrive under Jeff, Evans, and Alan’s leadership. We know the truth and we know the incredible things they’re capable of doing. The projects they’re working on will blow you away.

Best, Tim

Sent from my iPhone

The email has been called scathing. I’d go with emotional and strong. This is certainly a rebuttal, but it feels like someone defending their team, their hard work, and good name. I would expect nothing less from Tim.

The headline link is behind a paywall. Here’s a link to the article on Apple News that should work if you don’t have a WSJ subscription.

Tripp Mickle, Wall Street Journal:

For nearly three hours on that afternoon in January 2017, the group of about 20 designers stood around waiting for Mr. Ive to show, according to people familiar with the episode. After he arrived and listened to the presentations, he left without ruling on their key questions, leaving attendees frustrated.

“Many of us were thinking: How did it come to this?” said a person at the meeting. There was a sense “Jony was gone but reluctant to hand over the reins.”

The episode was emblematic of a widening disconnect at the top of Apple that, invisible outside the company, was eroding the product magic created by Mr. Ive and the late Steve Jobs that helped turn Apple into America’s pre-eminent corporation.

And:

Mr. Ive, 52, withdrew from routine management of Apple’s elite design team, leaving it rudderless, increasingly inefficient, and ultimately weakened by a string of departures, people close to the company say.

The internal drama explains a lot about Apple’s dilemma. Its one major new product of the post-Jobs era, the Apple Watch, made its debut five years ago.

And:

His departure from the company cements the triumph of operations over design at Apple, a fundamental shift from a business driven by hardware wizardry to one focused on maintaining profit margins and leveraging Apple’s past hardware success to sell software and services.

This is not a flattering portrayal. As usual with these sorts of articles, I take every anecdote with a grain of salt. Personally, I see iOS 13 and the continually impressive series of ARM chips as but two examples of major Apple products. True, iOS 13 is in early beta, but it is incredibly impressive.

But that last comment highlights a core issue for Apple. When they were smaller, it was easy to let genius lead. But with explosive growth comes the need for more dependence on operational expertise to inform the product pipeline. Less reliance on one visionary, more design by committee.

That’s the reality brought on by Apple’s exponential growth. It take a different set of hands to guide a single race car than a complex fleet of vehicles.

The article ends with:

Mr. Ive’s old design team—a group of aesthetes once thought of as gods inside Apple—will report to COO Jeff Williams, a mechanical engineer with an M.B.A.

I’d soften that statement with the belief that Apple is still chock full of visionaries, geniuses, and plenty of cash to continue their product pursuits.

Somewhat lost in the news of Jony Ive’s imminent departure comes news of a new addition to the executive team.

From Apple’s press release:

Apple today announced that Sabih Khan, a 24-year Apple veteran, has been named to the company’s executive team as senior vice president of Operations. Khan has played an important role in delivering each of Apple’s innovative products to market since the late 1990s, leading key product operations and supply chain functions. He continues to report to Jeff Williams, Apple’s chief operating officer.

In his new role, Khan will be in charge of Apple’s global supply chain, ensuring product quality and overseeing planning, procurement, manufacturing, logistics and product fulfillment functions, as well as Apple’s supplier responsibility programs that protect and educate workers at production facilities around the world.

Congratulations, Sabih.

Scroll all the way to the end of the linked piece to read the letter in full.

Chance Miller, 9to5Mac:

According to a new report from the San Francisco Chronicle, Apple has hired a “handful” of hardware and software engineers from self-driving car startup Drive.ai – which is planning to close its doors later this week.

Interesting read, including a confirmation from Apple (via Axios).

So very curious. What’s Apple up to here? Wondering if there’s a specific product in the pipeline, or perhaps still a broader R&D effort sussing out the space, exploring various business models.

I think about news sites and great election tools, like interactive maps that show voting trends, real time meters that show likelihood of candidates (sometimes famously incorrectly), and the like. Interesting to see Apple News getting into this business.

Here’s a link to the candidate guide. This is some good work. I found it easy to navigate, with lots of detail on each candidate.