After an internal memo regarding the new hire surfaced, Tricia Duryee of All Things Digital contacted PayPal to confirm the news. The online payment services company replied that it had indeed hired Apple veteran Sarah Brody as its new VP of Global Design.
According to her LinkedIn profile, Brody worked at Apple from 2001-2008 as an "R&D Designer, Creative Director & Hiring Manager." During her tenure, she worked on "more than a dozen different products including foundation software for Mac OS X/ ProKit, MobileMe, iPhone, Aperture, Final Cut Studio, Logic Pro and products still yet to be unveiled." Duryee reports that Brody worked on the first iPhone, as well as an "early version of the iPod Nano."
Brody also lists design work at Apple from January 2010 to December 2010 in her profile, but declined to specify what she worked on at that time, noting only that she was "always doing exciting new things at Apple." Brody began her work as Vice President of Global Design at PayPal last December.
A series of patent filings for a digital fitness companion system discovered by AppleInsider in 2008 list Brody as one of the inventors.
Apple, which is known for its ability to recruit and develop design talent, has seen a number of its designers move on to executive positions at other companies. In 2009, Apple's former creative director for packaging was hired by rival handset maker Palm as senior vice president, Brand Design.
Palm has taken a particular interest in former Apple employees, especially since it hired Apple's former senior engineering VP Jon Rubinstein as executive chairman. In 2009, Rubinstein, who helped design the first iPod before retiring from Apple in 2005, was promoted to CEO of Palm.
8 Comments
In most cases one can get a larger increase in salary in a 45 minute interview with a new company than working five years at one's present company. Having said this, I personally would not test this theory if I worked for Apple. I would probably stay at Apple. Unless I had a d**kh**d for a boss! Oh well best of luck!
PayPal has design??
I smell a PayPal Tablet! That's it, isn't it? PayPal wants in on the tablet craze. That's gotta be it.
I smell a PayPal Tablet! That's it, isn't it? PayPal wants in on the tablet craze. That's gotta be it.
PayPad? Ugh!
PayPal has design??
Really. That was my first thought as well. God, I hope they don't plan to do synergistic leveraging of lateral assets across emergent market paradigms, because I hate that generally and because PayPal are sort of dicks.