AAPL Company

John Ternus recruits key Apple hardware VP out of retirement ahead of CEO transition

Chance Miller | Aug 3 2026 - 1:30 pm PT

John Ternus is officially set to take over as Apple CEO on September 1. Ahead of that, he’s shaping the team around him and has brought back a key hardware engineering executive who retired several years ago.

Bloomberg reports that Ternus has hired Laura Legros to join his management team. Legros retired in 2022 after serving as a VP of hardware engineering on Ternus’s team.

When she returns to the company, Legros will reportedly “act as a vice president working cross-functionally with different parts of the company.” She will report directly to Ternus when he takes over as CEO on September 1.

Mark Gurman has some context on Legros’s role at Apple before retiring:

During her career at Apple, Legros helped manage product delivery, development schedules and coordination across engineering teams to ensure they remained aligned.

Before retiring, she was one of Ternus’ most trusted deputies. In 2018, she appeared during an Apple product launch event to introduce a new version of the MacBook Air. Two years later, she unveiled the current iPad Air design.

Today’s Bloomberg report also outlines the ongoing preparation inside Apple for the transition from Cook to Ternus.

Over the past several months, Ternus has been shadowing Cook and helping lead executive meetings. The incoming CEO has already met with leaders across the company and participated in road-map reviews for a number of divisions for the coming year.

Gurman points out that Ternus will have a slew of executive changes to oversee in the coming years as multiple members of Apple’s leadership team approach retirement age. This includes the likes of App Store boss Phil Schiller and Luca Maestri, who oversees real estate and information systems.