Apple Machine Learning Director Said to Quit Over Tech Giant’s Return-to-Work Policy

Computer scientist Ian Goodfellow in Mountain View, Calif., in 2017. (Courtesy of Ian Goodfellow/Wikimedia[CC BY-SA 4.0 (ept.ms/2j9VWgB)])

After two years of remote working, Apple, Inc. employees have shown reluctance to return to the office, even as the tech giant advocates a hybrid work policy. It now appears that Apple’s return-to-office move could hurt the company more than earlier thought.

What Happened

Apple’s director of machine learning, Ian Goodfellow, has departed in protest of its return-to-work policy, a tweet from Verge tech reporter Zoe Schiffer said.

Apple hired Goodfellow, a former Alphabet, Inc. executive, in April 2019. He also had a stint at Elon Musk-founded OpenAI lab.