Anthony (Tony) M. Fadell

Developer of technologies including the Sony Magic Link, Motorola Envoy, and the Apple iPod, Fadell is a Lebanese American computer science engineer. He served as Senior Vice President of the iPod Division at Apple Inc., having succeeded Jon Rubinstein in 2006. On November 4, 2008, Apple announced that he would be stepping down as Senior Vice President but would remain with the company as an adviser to then-CEO Steve Jobs. His wife, Danielle Lambert, Vice President of Human Resources at Apple, left the company soon thereafter.

Fadell attended Grosse Pointe South High School in Grosse Pointe Farms, Michigan, and graduated from the University of Michigan with a BS in Computer Engineering in 1991. While there, he was a member of the Phi chapter of Psi Upsilon Fraternity. Also while still at Michigan, he served as CEO of Constructive Instruments, which marketed MediaText, multimedia composition software for children.

He worked for Apple spinoff General Magic for three years, starting in 1992 as a diagnostics engineer and progressing to a systems architect, where Fadell was responsible for the development of a number of technologies and devices including the Sony Magic Link and Motorola Envoy, both of which were part of the Magic Cap platform. In 1995 he joined Philips as co-founder, Chief Technology Officer, and Director of Engineering in the Mobile Computing Group, which developed a number of Windows CE-based handheld services, notably the Philips Velo and Nino. He went on to serve as Vice President of Philips Strategy and Ventures, where Fadell was in charge of developing Philips' digital audio strategy consisting of technology direction for silicon and software, as well as its investment portfolio and potential business models.

During the 1990s, he started his own company called Fuse to develop the "Dell of the Consumer Electronics." One of the devices he had in mind was a small hard disk-based music player. Fuse failed, however, to find a second round of funding, and he began exploring developing the product at other companies. Fadell first approached RealNetworks in 2000, but left after only six weeks.

The second company he approached was Apple. He started doing work for Apple from February 2001 as a contractor designing the iPod and planning Apple's audio product strategy. In April 2001 Fadell joined Apple to assemble and run its iPod & Special Projects group, where he was tasked with overseeing the design and production of the iPod and iSight devices, following the direction of Jon Rubenstein. He was promoted to Vice President of iPod Engineering in 2004. On October 14, 2005, Apple announced that he would replace the retiring Jon Rubinstein as Senior Vice President of the iPod Division on March 31, 2006. On November 3, 2008, The Wall Street Journal broke the story of his departure from Apple.

Fadell founded Nest Labs in October 2010. Based in Palo Alto, California, Nest Labs—or Nest—has designed and manufactured a sensor-driven, Wi‑Fi-enabled, learning, programmable thermostat. His first recruit was Matt Rogers, who in May 2010 became a co-founder of Nest Labs.