Designing the Default: OpenAI, Jony Ive, and the $6.5B Attempt to Reboot Reality

OpenAI calls this ‘the biggest thing we’ve ever done.’

There are only a few times in modern tech history when we redesign the default object of human life.

The first was the PC.
The second was the smartphone.
We’re now on the cusp of the third - and it may not have a screen.

OpenAI just acquired Jony Ive’s secretive startup, io (lowercase, because of course), for a casual $6.5 billion. It’s the company's largest acquisition to date-and potentially the most consequential because it is their attempt to reset the interface layer of computing - before that layer calcifies again.

Simon & Garfunkel if they pivoted to context-aware AI hardware. "Hello darkness, my old friend… we’re removing screens again."

io was founded in 2023 by Ive and an Avengers-level cast of Apple alumni:

• Tang Tan, VP of product design (iPhone, Apple Watch)

• Evans Hankey, who succeeded Ive as VP of Industrial Design

• Scott Cannon, senior operations executive with deep Apple experience

The team operated under the umbrella of LoveFrom, Ive’s design collective, and in classic Ive fashion, they worked in total stealth. No leaks, no renders, just vibes - and apparently a device so sacred it couldn’t be worn, tapped, or looked at directly.

io reportedly had about 55 employees, nearly all ex-Apple talent. OpenAI invested early, taking a 23% stake before the acquisition.

🔮 Why This Actually Matters

• Strategically, it’s a Jobsian bet: that truly next-gen AI requires a native interface, not retrofitted screens. Think ambient computing, not apps.

• Symbolically, it's a full-circle moment: Ive, once Apple’s most treasured asset, now becomes its biggest threat. And unlike Apple, OpenAI is moving fast - and emotionally.

• Structurally, this is OpenAI pivoting from being “just an app” to a vertically integrated consumer platform. They don’t want to be the brain behind the glass. They want to design the glass, the touch, the feel - and maybe remove it altogether.

Apple’s AI problem just got worse. The man who defined its golden era has defected to the only team with product momentum - and a near cult-like pull over the future of computing.

👤 Why Jony Ive?

Because he’s done this before.

He didn’t just design the iPhone - he helped define how we live. A black glass rectangle that became the remote control for our attention, habits, relationships, and commerce. The tap-to-open, swipe-to-close, always-available UI of our lives wasn’t inevitable. It was invented.

Now, for the first time in nearly two decades, that default is up for grabs again.

After years of quiet reflection (and maybe regret), Ive wants to undo some of that seduction. He has spoken of “unintended consequences” of the devices he helped birth - attention fragmentation, interface fatigue, the erosion of ambient presence.

If Apple’s golden era was about making devices feel magical, this new movement seems intent on making them feel invisible.

🛠️ What We Know About The Device

The Wall Street Journal reported how on an internal call announcing the acqusition, Altman hinted that the device will be:

• Pocket-sized and screen-free

• Not a phone, not glasses, not wearable

• Aware of your life and context

• Meant to sit beside your laptop and iPhone - yet act as neither

It's described as unobtrusive, but also deeply intelligent. Not a new screen to stare at - maybe a companion to stare with. A “third core device” you put on a desk after a MacBook Pro and an iPhone.

Importantly, Ive reportedly loathes body-mounted tech. He has publicly dragged the Humane AI Pin, and Altman has ruled out anything wearable. So this won’t be clipped to your lapel, suction-cupped to your forehead, or surgically embedded behind your ear. Probably.

Altman also - without a hint of irony - claimed this device could add $1 trillion to OpenAI’s valuation. Which makes sense if you believe the next iPhone isn’t a phone

🧠 The Real Prize: A Default Device Transition

The iPhone didn’t win because it had the best specs. It won because it felt right. Because it told a new story about what computing could be.

Now we get to try again. Here's what that future might bring. Please bear with my speculation:

• Unbundling the smartphone: Instead of one do-it-all device, we could see a swarm of simpler, purpose-built AI companions - earpieces, wearables, ambient sensors.

• From touch to intention: Interfaces may shift from visual inputs to voice, gestures, or passive sensing. The goal is not speed but seamlessness.

• A return to quiet tech: With agents taking over routine tasks, the most disruptive device could be the one that interrupts us the least.

• AI as co-pilot, not controller: Done right, this could restore agency - letting us delegate without disconnecting from the world around us.

⚠️ But This Won’t Be Easy

Building AI-native hardware sounds cool. Until you try it. A few potholes ahead:

• Friction vs. control. When there’s no screen, how do you know what your agent did? Or why?

• Debugging the black box. A bug in a UI is annoying. A bug in an ambient AI agent is... existential?

• Hardware is hard. Manufacturing, distribution, supply chains, returns. Apple makes it look easy. It isn’t.

• Business model TBD. If the device is agent-first, what’s the business model? Is it a service layer like ChatGPT? A subscription? What’s the dev platform equivalent?

• Narrative buy-in. The iPhone wasn’t just a device - it was a story. One that people believed. You can’t A/B test that in a lab.

✨ We’re in the Primordial Soup Again

The iPhone feels inevitable today. But it was a choice - crafted by designers with a vision for a different relationship between humans and machines.

Now, 18 years later, we get to choose again.
Not just what the next device does, but what it means.

Will it make us more present? More distracted? More powerful?
That’s the job of the designer. And now, OpenAI has one of the best who’s ever lived.

The next few years won’t just be about better models. They’ll be about better mediums - for thinking, for being, for living with machines.