OpenAI Acquires Jony Ive’s Hardware Startup io for $6.4 Billion.
In its most ambitious move yet, OpenAI has acquired the hardware startup io for a staggering $6.4 billion. The unproven company was founded by legendary Apple designer Jony Ive, best known as the creative force behind the iPhone, iMac, iPod, and Apple Watch.
This marks OpenAI’s largest known acquisition to date and signals the AI giant’s expanding ambitions in the hardware space. The collaboration between Ive and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has reportedly been in the works for two years.
“A collaboration built upon friendship, curiosity and shared values quickly grew in ambition,” the duo wrote in a blog post. “Tentative ideas and explorations evolved into tangible designs.”
Founded just a year ago by Ive and a team of Apple alumni, io operates under Ive’s larger creative collective, LoveFrom. The collective includes artists, architects, engineers, musicians, and designers. Since his departure from Apple in 2019 after a storied 27-year career, Ive has remained largely out of the spotlight, focusing on select projects for clients such as Ferrari, Airbnb, and Christie’s.
RELATED: OpenAI Boss Sam Altman Denies Sister's Allegations of Childhood Abuse.
Despite io not having released any hardware yet, the acquisition underscores OpenAI’s strategic pivot toward physical devices. According to Bloomberg, while Ive won’t join OpenAI as a full-time employee, his design firm will now lead all product and software design for the company.
“The io team will merge with OpenAI to work more intimately with the research, engineering and product teams in San Francisco,” Altman and Ive said.
Ive is also designing a new headquarters in San Francisco for the combined project, further solidifying the long-term nature of the partnership.
RELATED: Musk's xAI Launches Grok-3 Chatbot to Compete with OpenAI and DeepSeek.
OpenAI has already shown signs of moving into hardware. The company has hired high-profile talent like Caitlin “CK” Kalinowski, who led Meta’s augmented reality glasses initiative. Kalinowski said on LinkedIn that she’ll be focusing on “robotics work and partnerships to help bring AI into the physical world.” The company has also invested in Physical Intelligence, a robotics startup with similar aims.
The acquisition comes amid a wave of growth and investment for OpenAI. Valued at $300 billion, the company recently closed a $40 billion funding round led by SoftBank. Microsoft, which invested $13 billion in 2023, holds a 49% stake in OpenAI. This year alone, OpenAI has also acquired Windsurf, an AI-assisted coding tool, for $3 billion, and real-time analytics firm Rockset.
OpenAI’s acquisition of io is a bold step toward integrating artificial intelligence with iconic hardware design. With Jony Ive’s creative vision and Sam Altman’s technological leadership, the partnership promises to reshape the future of how humans interact with AI. By combining Ive’s attention to detail and form with OpenAI’s breakthroughs in machine learning, the company is poised to create not just powerful tools, but beautifully intuitive ones. This collaboration symbolizes the next frontier in human-centered technology, blending the elegance of design with the depth of intelligence—offering a future where AI isn’t just smart, but also seamlessly embedded into daily life.
