Apple has lost yet another upper-level executive to OpenAI, this time Paul Meade from its Vision Products Group.
Longtime Apple executive Paul Meade, known for his work on the Apple Vision Pro, is reportedly leaving Cupertino for Mission Bay. There, he'll join OpenAI alongside fellow Apple alumni Jony Ive, Tang Tan, and Evans Hankey.
According to Bloomberg, the vice president of hardware engineering for the Vision Products Group is set to depart for OpenAI at some point in the next week. He'll start working at OpenAI's hardware unit on OpenAI's upcoming line of AI-powered devices.
Meade's tenure at Apple lasted over 15 years. He first joined in 2010 as an iPad manager. Two years later, he oversaw program management for the iPhone.
In 2017, he joined the Vision Products Group. Then, in 2019, after a notable shift in Apple's management, he overtook all hardware engineering for the Apple Vision Pro.
Meade is just another in a long line of departures. In October 2025, Apple lost Head of the Apple Intelligence Answers, Knowledge, and Information team, Ke Yang, to Meta.
Apple's VP of Human Interface Design, Alan Dye, also left for Meta two months later.
OpenAI, who acquired Jony Ive's AI startup in 2025, seems to have a special interest in poaching Apple veterans. Tang Tan, who formerly worked at Apple, was instrumental in recruiting Cyrus Daniel Irani from Apple's human interface design team and Erik de Jong from Apple Watch hardware.
