Amazon Brings Xbox Co-Founder To Lead ZeroOne To Make ‘Breakthrough’ Consumer Products

Allard joined Amazon in September to work under another former Microsoft leader, Panos Panay, who is currently the head of Amazon’s devices and services team.

Amazon.com Inc. (AMZN) has looped in Xbox co-founder J. Allard to lead a new devices team called ZeroOne.

According to a report by CNBC, Amazon’s ZeroOne team is tasked with conceptualizing and creating “breakthrough” consumer products. It added that Amazon has confirmed that Allard leads the ZeroOne team.

The ZeroOne team is spread across Seattle, San Francisco, and Sunnyvale. The report added that job postings suggest the ZeroOne team has both software and hardware projects to work on.

Although it’s not clear exactly what product category the ZeroOne team is aiming for, one of the job listings for the group points to a new smart-home product that utilizes computer vision technologies.

Another listing points to the ZeroOne team being small and nimble, although there is no specific number that’s known publicly.

“If you’re excited about working in small, nimble teams to create entirely new product categories and thrive in the ambiguity of breakthrough innovation, we want to talk to you,” the listing says, according to the report.

Allard joined Amazon in September to work under another former Microsoft leader, Panos Panay, who is currently the head of Amazon’s devices and services team.

He worked at Microsoft for 19 years before leaving the company. He co-founded the Xbox and the Zune music player. While Xbox still thrives, the Zune failed to compete with Apple’s iPod and fell by the wayside.

Amazon has had its hits and misses in the hardware segment. While the Kindle e-reader has been a huge success for the company, the Fire Phone and Glow teleconferencing devices have flopped.

Amazon’s stock is down 6.34% year-to-date, but up 12.93% over the past 12 months.

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