Apple Executive Exodus: AI Chief, Design Head, General Counsel Exit Amid Talent Drain & AI Strategy Woes

Apple is undergoing one of its most significant leadership shake-ups currently, as a cluster of senior executives are departing or preparing to exit within days, Bloomberg reported.

The departures reportedly include the company’s head of artificial intelligence and its lead for user-interface design, while the general counsel and the head of environment and policy have announced plans to retire. Those moves, affecting executives who reported directly to CEO Tim Cook, mark an unusually concentrated period of turnover at the top of the iPhone maker’s organization.

Implications

Apple confirmed that John Giannandrea, who has overseen machine learning and AI strategy since 2018, is stepping down and will remain as an adviser through next spring. Alan Dye, the veteran interface design lead, has left for Meta’s Reality Labs.

General counsel Kate Adams and Lisa Jackson, vice-president for environment, policy and social initiatives, have informed Apple they intend to retire within the next year, departures that will strip the company of deep expertise across legal, regulatory and design domains.

The exits add to existing turbulence following the recent retirement of former COO Jeff Williams and have already triggered a broad internal reshuffle. Apple has reassigned major AI responsibilities to software chief Craig Federighi and brought in Amar Subramanya, a former Google and Microsoft executive, as vice-president of AI reporting into Federighi. Stephen Lemay has stepped into Dye’s design role, and other portfolios are being redistributed across senior leaders.

The turnover underscores a wider talent drain. Multiple AI and robotics researchers have moved to competitors such as Meta and OpenAI, attracted by richer compensation and opportunities to work on frontier-scale models. Teams building large language models, robotics software, Vision Pro components and other next-generation devices have seen notable departures, raising concerns about continuity across several flagship projects.

Dent in AI Plan

The biggest uncertainty, however, surrounds Johny Srouji, the senior vice-president for hardware technologies and the architect behind Apple’s custom silicon. People familiar with internal discussions say Srouji has told Cook he is seriously weighing an exit and may consider offers from other firms. Apple has reportedly offered enhanced incentives and expanded roles to retain him. His departure would strike at the heart of Apple’s competitive edge, as its in-house chip program underpins everything from iPhones and Macs to future wearable and spatial computing devices.

These shifts come at a sensitive moment for Apple’s product roadmap. Ambitious efforts in smart glasses, robotics, foldable iPhones and an overhauled Siri have encountered delays and uneven reviews. The company’s privacy-centric, on-device approach to AI has also contributed to internal tension, with some engineers pushing for faster iteration and more aggressive investment in cloud-scale models.

Reason & Road Ahead

The reasons behind the exodus vary. Several executives were nearing retirement after decades at Apple; others left for high-profile roles in the accelerating AI race; and some appear frustrated with the company’s measured, hardware-first approach to integrating AI across its ecosystem.

Amid the turbulence, Apple’s board and top leadership are balancing immediate damage control with long-term succession planning.

Hardware engineering chief John Ternus, seen internally as a leading contender for CEO someday, has gained additional responsibilities, while authority is increasingly distributed across Federighi, Eddy Cue and new COO Sabih Khan. Tim Cook, now 65, is expected by many insiders to stay engaged for the near term, potentially transitioning to a chairman role rather than stepping aside abruptly.