Jonathan Ive is officially the Chief Design Officer (CDO) of Apple. He was previously the company's senior vice president of design and headed the hardware and human interface design departments.
In May this year, Apple revealed in a company email that, by July 1, Ive would be promoted to CDO, handing over the responsibility of the design teams to Alan Dye and Richard Howarth, who have been named VPs.
Dye has been with Apple's marketing team since 2006, whereas Howarth joined the company in 1996 and has been part of "every Apple product since the original iMac." Moreover, Howarth also took the lead design role for the Apple Watch and iPhone.
At the time of the promotion announcement, Apple also let on that Ive would remain responsible for the designs of Apple's products even though his responsibilities were shifting. He would also be focusing on the restructuring of the Apple Stores, along with other projects.
On Wednesday, Apple updated the bios of its executives on the Apple Leadership page to reflect the new promotions.
"Jony is responsible for all design at Apple, including the look and feel of Apple hardware, user interface, packaging, major architectural projects such as Apple Campus 2 and Apple's retail stores, as well as new ideas and future initiatives," reads his bio.
Apple also included bios of the both Howarth, VP of Industrial Design, and Dye, VP of UI Design. However, there is a twist in tale. Both the VPs will be reporting directly to Apple's CEO Tim Cook and not Ive as assumed.
This fuels speculation over who the decision maker is at Apple when it comes to major design approvals. The move of having both Howarth and Dye report to Cook also adds to the notion that the decision to make Ive CDO was in a bid to gradually make the design chief sidestep from the company in a polite manner.
