OpenAI is now talking openly about a family of AI devices, just as Apple is trying to drag its hardware plans into court.
Greg Brockman has moved OpenAI's hardware ambitions out of the rumor file. In an interview covered by The Verge this week, OpenAI's president said the company is building a "family of devices" for its AI products and told readers to expect them soon. He also put voice at the center of the plan, saying the keyboard and mouse may come to look like a temporary phase in computing.
That is a big claim. It is also a useful one: it tells you how OpenAI sees the next fight. The company doesn't want ChatGPT living inside someone else's phone forever. It wants its own device - or several - built around the assistant from the ground up.
OpenAI has been heading this way since it bought io Products, Jony Ive's hardware startup. The deal was announced in May 2025 and closed in July. OpenAI said the io team would merge into the company while Ive and LoveFrom stayed independent and took on design and creative responsibilities across OpenAI. The Information reported the deal was worth about $6.5 billion and brought in roughly 55 employees. OpenAI's own announcement named io's founders as Ive, Scott Cannon, Evans Hankey, and Tang Tan.
There are still more reports than products. TechCrunch reported in January that OpenAI's Chris Lehane said at a Davos panel that the first hardware device was on track to be announced in the second half of 2026, while other reports pointed to an earbud-style device codenamed Sweet Pea and a possible first-year shipment target of 40 million to 50 million units. Treat those details carefully. OpenAI hasn't shown the device, and it hasn't confirmed the final form factor.
The lawsuit changes the temperature #
Apple filed suit on July 10 in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, accusing OpenAI and Tang Tan of trade secret theft. Bloomberg Law reported that Apple's complaint says OpenAI encouraged Apple employees to share information, components, drawings, and other materials tied to upcoming products. TechCrunch reported that the complaint also alleges Tan used Apple project code names in recruiting and asked candidates to bring Apple hardware components to interviews.
Those are allegations, not findings. OpenAI has denied wrongdoing. In a statement reported by TechCrunch after the filing, the company said it wasn't aware of evidence that the complaint had merit and said it believed in fair competition and the freedom to work wherever people choose.
Brockman gave a shorter version when asked about it. The Verge reported that he said OpenAI is focused on its own innovation and has no interest in other companies' trade secrets. That answer won't settle the lawsuit. Courts do that. But it does show OpenAI isn't slowing the public hardware pitch while the case moves forward.
The timing is awkward. It is not fatal. Big technology companies sue each other while still shipping products and hiring engineers and cutting supply deals. Apple knows this better than anyone. The sharper point is that Apple now sees OpenAI's hardware work as serious enough to fight in court before the main consumer device has even reached buyers.
The first product is smaller than the ambition #
OpenAI has already shipped one piece of hardware, although it is not the Ive device. Fortune reported that on July 15 the company released Codex Micro, a $230 compact keyboard made with Work Louder for developers using OpenAI's Codex coding tool. It has a 12-key pad, a joystick, a dial, lights, and a microphone button. It sold out in about 12 hours.
Don't overread it. Codex Micro is a developer control surface, not an iPhone rival. Fortune reported that one unit was listed on eBay for $1,850, though completed sales were lower and resale prices quickly fell. Still, it gives OpenAI something practical: real buyers, real hardware feedback, and a genuine read on how people want to control AI agents with something other than a laptop keyboard.
OpenAI is also building below the device layer. On June 24, OpenAI and Broadcom announced Jalapeno, OpenAI's first custom AI accelerator for large language model inference. OpenAI said the chip was developed from design to production tape-out in nine months, with Broadcom and Celestica helping on implementation, boards, rack systems, networking, and production systems. This is the full-stack push in plain sight. Models, software, chips, consumer hardware - the whole column.
Some chip claims still need restraint. Analyst Ming-Chi Kuo has claimed OpenAI is working on smartphone silicon involving Qualcomm and MediaTek, with mass production later in the decade, and Fortune noted that neither company had confirmed the report. That belongs in the category of supply-chain reporting, not settled fact. The confirmed part is Broadcom and Jalapeno.
Here's the thing: AI hardware has already embarrassed companies with more confidence than product discipline. Humane raised more than $230 million and sold most of its assets to HP for $116 million, according to TechCrunch. That's a steep fall. The Verge's reporting, summarized by 9to5Mac, said Humane had only about 7,000 units still in customers' hands by August 2024 after returns outpaced sales. Rabbit said it sold 100,000 R1 devices after CES, but reviewers quickly found that many promised agent features didn't work reliably at launch.
The graveyard is real. Humane and Rabbit didn't fail because people disliked AI. They failed because a separate gadget has to earn its place every day - in your pocket, on your desk, in your ear, competing against the phone you already trust. A demo is not enough.
OpenAI has advantages those companies didn't: ChatGPT distribution, Ive's design group, and Broadcom silicon work - plus the money to survive a few bad prototypes. Apple and Google should take that seriously. Both have spent years treating AI as something added to existing devices. If OpenAI builds a device where the assistant isn't layered on top but is the whole point - where voice and memory do the work your apps currently do - the phone makers have a different problem.
But the question is still brutally simple. What does this device do better than the phone already in your hand? Until OpenAI answers that with a product rather than a quote, the lawsuit is only half the story.
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