Meta poaches Apple design exec Alan Dye to lead new creative studio in Reality Labs

Alan Dye, the design executive who led Apple’s user interface team for the last decade, is leaving the company to join Meta, according to a report from Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman.

This is a significant hire for Meta, as the company makes a push toward consumer devices like smart glasses and virtual reality headsets. Dye will focus on improving AI features in these devices and report directly to Chief Technology Officer Andrew Bosworth.

At Apple, Dye will be replaced by Steve Lemay, who has had “a key role in the design of every major Apple interface since 1999,” according to a statement Apple CEO Tim Cook gave Bloomberg.

It seems that Meta is recruiting from its competitors to help the company compete in the AI race, as Meta also poached researchers from OpenAI this summer. (Allegedly, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg hand-delivered homemade soup to an OpenAI employee in a recruitment push; OpenAI chief research officer Mark Chen said that he has since delivered his own soup to promising Meta recruits.)

Shortly after the news broke of Dye’s departure, Zuckerberg announced a new creative studio within Reality Labs that would be led by Dye. There, he’ll be joined by Billy Sorrentino, another former Apple designer who led interface design across Reality Labs; Joshua To, who led interface design across Reality Labs; Meta’s industrial design team, led by Pete Bristol; and its metaverse design and art teams led by Jason Rubin. 

Zuckerberg said the studio would “bring together design, fashion, and technology to define the next generation of our products and experiences.”

“Our idea is to treat intelligence as a new design material and imagine what becomes possible when it is abundant, capable, and human-centered,” the Meta CEO wrote on Threads. “We plan to elevate design within Meta, and pull together a talented group with a combination of craft, creative vision, systems thinking, and deep experience building iconic products that bridge hardware and software.”

This article was updated after publication with additional information about Meta’s plans.