There are several other departures from that era worth mentioning, including Greg Christie, who was the VP of Human Interface Design at Apple. Christie and his team were directly responsible for some of the more iconic iPhone UI elements, including slide-to-unlock and many of the multitouch gestures that quickly became standard across the industry. Christie retired from Apple in 2014.
When Christie retired, Apple issued a statement noting that “Greg… has made vital contributions to Apple products across the board, and built a world-class Human Interface team which has worked closely with Jony for many years.”
One year earlier, Apple also endured the departure of Henri Lamiraux, the company’s VP of iOS engineering. Lamiraux was a 30-year Apple veteran at the time of his retirement and was an instrumental figure in the development of the iPhone. Put simply, a good deal of the engineering infrastructure that made iOS possible is attributable to Lamiraux and his team. Before that, Lamiraux played an important role in transitioning Apple to the OS X era.
Within three years, Apple lost three key members of the original iPhone design team. And yet, iPhone and iOS development soldiered on. Again, this isn’t to minimize the importance of these employees, but rather to emphasize that Apple is a massive company with tens of thousands of employees. It has the ability to withstand important employee losses in a way that perhaps other companies can’t.
There are several other examples of high-profile executive departures from Apple during the post-iPhone era, including Tony Fadell, who would later go on to found Nest Labs with another former Apple engineer named Matt Rogers. It’s also worth mentioning the departure of Bob Mansfield, who left Apple in 2012, only to be convinced to stay on for a few more years by Tim Cook. Mansfield ultimately left the company for good in 2015. More recently, Apple executive Phil Schiller stepped down as the company’s VP of marketing in 2020.
Beyond product design and development, Apple in the post-iPhone era also lost Ron Johnson, the executive who helped build Apple’s retail footprint from scratch. While there are currently hundreds of Apple retail stores scattered across the globe, Apple’s foray into retail was a risky move early on. Johnson’s expertise, however, helped Apple’s bet pay off. Johnson left Apple in 2011 to become the CEO of J.C. Penney. Apple’s retail initiatives, meanwhile, didn’t slow down or become less successful.
