**: Ray Technology
Another executive from Apple's design department has left, why should I say again?Because he wasn't the first executive to leave this year, and probably won't be the last. If you're paying attention to Apple's design team, you may remember that last year Apple announced the termination of the contract with Lovefrom and broke up with Jony Lve for good.
Jone Lve was once Apple's most important chief designer, responsible for and involved in the original design of a large number of core products, and was even called Jobs' soul mate. Jone Lve left a few years ago to start Lovefrom, and Apple signed a partnership agreement with Lovefrom to hire the company as a design consultant.
Note: Jony LVE Source: Wikipedia.
Within Apple, the core projects that were originally managed by Johny Ive were basically assigned to different people, and after a series of personnel changesTang Tan took over crucial projects for the iPhone and Apple Watch, and he is another Apple executive who announced this week that he will leave Apple.
Tang Tan's name may be unfamiliar to most netizens, but within Apple, he has long been considered one of the core of the product design team. Both the iPhone and Apple Watch are at the heart of Apple's products at the moment, and handing over both projects to Tang Tan is a testament to Apple's trust in its capabilities.
Note: Tang Tan Source: LinkedIn.
According to Apple insiders, Tang Tan's departure has had a big impact on the entire design team, leaving many colleagues worried about the future. It is reported that Tang Tan's projects actually include AirPods, and it is with Tang Tan's participation that AirPods have gradually become the most popular headphone products in the world, and at the same time have led the transformation of the entire headphone industry in the past few years.
Tang Tan has played a key role in the development iteration of the iPhone, Apple Watch, and AirPods, so Apple's internal employees have always rated it highly. Perhaps because Tang Tan's position is so important, Apple has not announced a successor until now, and it is clear that Apple is also in a dilemma: who will take over these vital tasks?
At the same time, Tang Tan's departure has also triggered concerns about the progress of Apple's next series of products, although the appearance design of iPhone and other products has been complained by many fruit fans for thousands of years, but in terms of interaction, wearing, holding and other aspects of the experience, has been improving and improving, these are one of the core factors for Apple's products to remain competitive.
With Tang Tan's departure, will the successor be able to maintain the same momentum, optimize the design of Apple products, or even make breakthroughs?I'm afraid all of this has to be marked with a question mark. In the past two years, Apple's management has been in an undercurrent, and many former executives have either retired or left, which has had a great impact on the implementation and promotion of Apple's product plan.
Source: Apple
For example, at the end of 2022, Laura Legros, who is in charge of hardware product management, announced that he would retire from Apple, and Yannick Bertolus, who took over Laqura Legros, also announced his retirement in October this year. In addition, Steve Hotelling, who is responsible for key technologies such as iPhone touch screens, Touch ID, and Face ID, recently announced his retirement.
For a giant company like Apple, the departure of some people will not have much impact on the whole, but if the resignation and retirement are all former department and team leaders, then it is difficult to say. Apple's internal employees said that the frequent departure of key people has taken a big toll on the team's morale, and has also led to some omissions in some work.
This can't help but remind people of the large number of serious bugs that appeared after the release of iOS 17, and it is not surprising that there are bugs in the new system, but the number of vicious bugs in iOS 17 is far higher than before, and it is clear that it cannot be simply attributed to the small problems that are common when the system is updated with major versions.
At the same time, Apple's inaction in design in recent years has also made many fruit fans complain, making people wonder whether Apple has lost its ability to innovate in design
In the past, Apple attached great importance to the appearance design of products, so many epoch-making classic products were born, from iMac G3 to MacBook, from MacBook to iPhone, Apple showed a new future to the world with the ultimate industrial design.
The impact of Apple's style on the consumer electronics market is profound"Apple wind"It has become the goal pursued by many manufacturersJust like the smartphone market in the past, people often target the iPhone as a imitation target"It feels like an iPhone"It once became a comment when people discussed the appearance of a mobile phone.
Behind all this is actually Jobs, as Apple's chief designer, Jobs has a stubborn pursuit of the appearance of the product, and will even give up some performance, experience and features for the sake of appearance. This may seem extreme to the pragmatist, but in the eyes of most ordinary consumers, appearance may even take precedence over performance and experience.
Source: Apple.
Moreover, Apple has always been committed to building its own software ecosystem, attracted by the appearance and unique application ecology, the loyalty and repurchase rate of Apple users have always been very high, which is also the core factor that Apple has been able to lead the consumer electronics market in the past ten years.
However, with the departure of soul figures such as Steve Jobs and Jone Lve, Apple, after Cook took over, gradually surpassed the design in terms of product practicality and cost. Allegedly,Jone Lve chose to leave because Cook let the cost control department gradually occupy a greater voice in the product design process, resulting in Jone Lve not being able to promote itself.
However, compared with Jone LVE, Tang Tan, who took over part of the work later, is obviously a more pragmatic person, and there is no conflict of ideas with Cook, so the outside world also has different opinions about the reason for Tang Tan's departure.
Looking back, we also have to admit that Apple after Cook is indeed far inferior in appearance innovation, and many design changes are actually in the service of hardware and functionality. Of course, we can also see counter-examples, such as cutting the MacBook Air's cooling module in order to be thin and light, even though the M-series chips generate less heat than the X86 processor, but multiple tests have shown that the MacBook Air does have overheating and throttling when used.
Moreover,Appearance design is no longer the core consideration for consumers to buy Apple products, and the performance of application ecology and mobile experience has a greater impact on consumers' choicesApple has also put more effort into optimizing performance and features.
Personally, design and practicality should be balanced, over-focusing on one aspect is not a good thing, as a giant in the field of consumer electronics, Apple's direction is not just affecting their own products, as a digital enthusiast, I also hope that Apple can reconsider the position of product design in the product ecology.