Paul Meade, the executive who led hardware engineering for Apple’s Vision Pro headset and its smart glasses project, is leaving the company to join OpenAI’s hardware division, according to sources familiar with the matter.

Meade had overseen Vision Pro hardware engineering for seven years and was also spearheading development of a display-less smart eyewear product, which Apple had reportedly planned to launch next year to compete with Meta and others in the AI wearables space.

His departure is a significant loss for Apple. His responsibilities will be taken over by his longtime deputy, Fletcher Rothkopf. Meade’s exit also comes amid broader leadership changes at the tech giant: hardware engineering chief John Ternus is set to succeed Tim Cook as CEO in September, while chip chief Johny Srouji has been promoted to chief hardware officer and has already begun restructuring the hardware engineering division.

At OpenAI, Meade will join several former Apple colleagues, including Jony Ive, Tang Tan, and Evans Hankey, whose AI hardware startup was acquired by OpenAI last year for $6.5 billion.