CREATIVE CREW CREDITED WITH APPLE COMEBACK.

Byline: Martha Mendoza Associated Press 

Affable and approachable, yet cutting-edge and talented, Jonathan Ive isn't all that different from the Apple computers he designs.

Except for the color thing, that is.

iMacs, the eye-catching machines that are shaking up the personal computing market, come in five colors: strawberry, blueberry, grape, tangerine and lime.

Ive spends more than 70 hours a week at work and comes in pale. His London-bred pallor contrasts sharply with his dark sideburns and unshaven chin, giving the 32-year-old a sleepy slacker look in faded jeans and a surfer's shirt.

Actually, Ive is a corporate vice president whose creative designs have helped bring Apple out of a major slump. The company has registered five straight quarters of profits after nearly $2 billion in losses over two years.

The bulbous and bright iMac, unveiled last August, has rapidly become a favorite with individual computer buyers. During the weekend following the launch of the iMac in August, consumers who loved the look as well as the ready-to-use systems took home more than 150,000. By the end of the year, 800,000 had been sold.

The iMac was the top-selling personal computer in retail stores during the fourth quarter of 1998, and sales of the iMac pushed Apple past IBM into third place in retail sales market share in February, according to the research firm PC Data.

The figures don't include most sales to businesses, a much larger portion of the personal computer market where bland beige-color machines using Microsoft Windows software and Intel computer chips remain overwhelmingly dominant.

Worldwide, Apple still has just 4.4 percent of the PC market, said Dataquest, a high-tech research firm.

Nonetheless, the iMac's popularity with consumers shows how Apple is changing the way people choose their computers - by appearance and image, not just technical prowess. Indeed, this was one of the few options Apple had left because Microsoft had matched many of the easy-to-use features that once distinguished the Macintosh.

``The iMac's form is almost a complete departure from computers of old,'' said computer reviewers for C-NET, an online news service that declared it the most innovative product on the market last year.

Design awards also rolled in from Newsweek, Time, Popular Science and USA Today.

Ive is also behind the popular PowerMac G3, Apple's new business computer that features carrying handles and a swing-down side door so users can easily peek inside and check out its guts.

Ive, who spent four years in art school, takes the compliments and the sales figures personally. If people like his designs, they like him.

``People want to pat them,'' he said.

That's a good thing?

Well, yes. Just ask Ive's boss, Jon Rubinstein.

``People have a personal relationship with their Apple computer that you just don't see in the PC world,'' said Rubinstein, stroking an iMac monitor perched on a desk of an Apple meeting room. ``They can't help but touch them.''

Rubinstein, who joined Apple in 1997 as senior vice president of engineering, is a conservative counterpart to Ive.

While he sometimes has to rein in Ive's crew when their designs get too grand, Rubinstein also says it helps to leave them alone. ``These people are, you know, incredibly creative.''

And alone they are.

Across a busy Silicon Valley boulevard from Apple Computer's showcase campus is a nondescript, beige building with a small Apple logo at the entrance.

The entry hall is locked. On the far end are a pair of smoky glass doors that outsiders can't get beyond.

Behind them is where Ive and his staff from around the world ponder and invent computer designs. Apple will not reveal how many people work there, nor what they spend.

But Ive says they toil surrounded by ``bips and bops that we've brought in'' for creative inspiration. There's a movie projector and plenty of films, skateboards, diving equipment, lots of toys and dozens of magazines.

Working in this environment, the designers produce foam models of computers.

For years, Ive said, managers sent them back to their drawing boards with focus groups and marketing figures.

``We lost our identity and looked to competition for leadership,'' said Ive.

But when founder Steve Jobs returned last year as interim chief executive, the design team was finally empowered.

``Steve understands us as creatives,'' said Ive. ``He's got a real heart for design.''

Ive and Rubinstein won't credit any individual person for the original idea behind the iMac, but those involved in the project agree that the concept was accepted immediately, and that the shape went through very few revisions.

``We knew we had it when we saw it, and with Jobs' support, we were able to make it happen,'' said Ive.

This innovation, combined with support from engineers and management, is credited with fueling the company's comeback.

Ive's contribution to this resurgence has not been missed.

Almost every week he gets a call from a company - from cars to sneakers - pitching him with a job.

But Ive, who lives in San Francisco with his novelist wife, Heather, says he couldn't do this work anywhere else.

``The thing is, you could transplant me and this design group to another place, and we wouldn't work at all,'' he said.

Ive won't say how much money he's making, but he blushes, coughs out an embarrassed laugh and finally says, ``It's gone up.''

When he's not working, Ive is seeking a ``serene life.'' He dabbles with techno-pop - computer-generated music - and hangs out with his Apple pals.

Analysts warn that Apple's biggest mistake, now that they're coming back, would be to become too comfortable with their success.

But Ive frowns only for a moment at that suggestion, staring at his hands. Then he brightens up, remembering a secret he's duty-bound to keep: their next computer, a laptop model Apple has promised to release later this year.

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Photo

PHOTO (Color) Jonathan Ive, left, Apple Computer's vice president of design, and Jon Rubinstein, Apple's senior vice president of engineering, are proud of Apple's colorful iMac PCs.

Susan Ragan/Associated Press