Apple promotes design legend Jony Ive

Apple has promoted British designer Sir Jony Ive to the newly created role of Chief Design Officer from July.

Ive, previously Senior Vice President of Design, was knighted in 2012 for his contribution to Apple’s most popular gadgets. His insistence that the iPod, iPhone, iPad and smartwatch be a fusion of function and form not only made them hugely popular butalso had a massive influence in the tech world.

The company’s CEO Tim Cook says that Ive’s new role will see him move away from devices and into designing other projects.

These include Apple retail stores as well as its Californian campus to house 12,000 workers and due to open late 2016 or early 2017. Ive will not only be designing the spaceship-designed building but also its desks and chairs.

Speculation is that Ive will be also involved in the car that Apple is creating.Apple, which has been (as is rival Google which has similar plans) hiring the best brains in the automotive business in recent years, has recently been poaching its engineers and electronic experts as well.

The new role gives Ive the power and influence in design to that of Cook. London-born Ive worked closely with Apple founder Steve Job from the ‘90s in turning the fortunes of the company around from near- financial ruin to being the most valuable company in the world with a worth of US$763.6 billion.

"Jony is one of the most talented and accomplished designers of his generation, with an astonishing 5,000 design and utility patents to his name," Cook said in an internal memo to staff.

48-year-old Ive has admitted that he is exhausted, saying, "I just burnt myself into not being very well." The new role frees him from day to day management duties.

These will now be shared by Ive’s long time lieutenant Richard Howarth, who played a key role in the design of the iPhone and now becomes Head of Industrial Design, and Alan Dye whose new job as Vice President of User Interface Design puts him in charge of engineering the way consumers interact with its desktop and mobile software. Dye, who joined Apple seven years ago, was a key player in iOS 7’s major redesign as well as the work on the new Watch OS.