It is tempting to see this week’s attempt by OpenAI to plant its flag in the consumer hardware business as a similar challenge to another tech empire: Apple. As he announced the purchase of io, a tech hardware start-up co-founded by Jony Ive,

The idea is a “chance to do the biggest thing we’ve ever done as a company here,” Altman told OpenAI employees Wednesday.

The all-stock deal with OpenAI values Ive’s AI hardware startup io at $6.5 billion—and is set to be a major windfall for the man who designed the iPhone.

OpenAI says partnering with the "greatest designer in the world" will allow it to re-imagine what a computer can do.