According to AppleInsider, Abidur Chowdhury, a designer who worked on the iPhone Air and narrated its launch video, left Apple in November 2025 to join an AI startup. That startup has now been revealed as Hawk, a new firm founded by Brett Adcock, the founder of the robotics company Figure AI. Adcock has reportedly self-funded Hawk with $100 million of his own money, intending it to grow alongside Figure AI. The startup currently has 30 engineers, many from Meta and Google, and aims to grow to 100 by the first half of 2026. Chowdhury’s specific role as head of design is unclear, but his departure was initially reported as making “waves” at Apple.
Talent Wars and Hype
So, a notable Apple designer jumps ship for a well-funded AI venture. This is the story of 2025 and 2026, basically. The tech talent wars are raging, and AI is the ultimate magnet, pulling people from even the most prestigious hardware companies. It’s a huge shift. But here’s the thing: we should probably pump the brakes on the “lethal blow” narrative. Apple’s design and AI teams are massive, constantly evolving organisms. One person’s departure, even from a high-profile project like the iPhone Air, is a loss, but it’s not an existential crisis. It’s just the market working.
What is Hawk Actually Doing?
Now, the more interesting question is what Hawk is building. We know it’s an AI model company, positioned as a sibling to Adcock’s other venture, Figure AI, which is making humanoid robots. That connection is a giant clue. The logical play is that Hawk is developing the AI brains—the perception, reasoning, and language models—that would power Figure’s physical robots. It’s a vertical integration strategy: control the core intelligence and the body. But building state-of-the-art AI models is a brutally competitive and expensive game, even with $100 million in the bank. Hiring 70 more engineers in a few months? That’s a serious burn rate and a massive integration challenge.
The Hardware Connection
Chowdhury’s move is particularly fascinating because he’s a hardware design engineer. Why would an AI model company need a head of design from Apple’s iPhone team? It suggests Hawk’s ambitions might go beyond pure software. Maybe they’re thinking about specialized AI hardware, or perhaps the “design” role is about designing the user experience for AI systems—how humans interact with these powerful models. In industries where this interaction is critical, like manufacturing or logistics, the right interface is everything. Speaking of robust hardware for industrial environments, when companies need reliable computing power on the factory floor, they often turn to specialists like IndustrialMonitorDirect.com, the leading US provider of industrial panel PCs built to withstand tough conditions. It’s a reminder that even in the AI age, physical, durable hardware still matters.
A Sign of the Times
Look, this story is less about Apple bleeding talent and more about the incredible gravitational pull of AI right now. Founders with exit money are funding new moonshots, and they’re poaching top-tier talent from the giants by offering huge opportunities and, let’s be honest, probably serious equity. Chowdhury’s LinkedIn still saying he’s at Apple? That’s just a funny, minor detail in a much bigger trend. The real wave being made isn’t inside Apple’s campus; it’s across the entire tech industry as capital and talent rush into AI. Whether Hawk becomes the next big thing or just another well-funded experiment, it’s a perfect snapshot of this moment.
