[NewsPoster]

One of Apple's latest major hires is one that will be working on the company's health-related projects for iOS devices. Yoky Matsuoka, a robotics expert who helped co-found Google's experimental X Lab and is a former head of technology for the Google-owned Nest, is joining Apple to help further the current wellness initiatives, namely HealthKit, ResearchKit, and CareKit, and potentially help produce other projects in the same field.

The former Googler departed from Nest last year, and was due to take a vice president role at Twitter, reports Fortune. Matsuoka was then unable to take up the role at the microblogging service after being diagnosed with a "life-threatening illness," which she revealed in a Medium post that getting the illness "essentially erased" her life for a period of time.

Originally moving from Japan to the United States for a career in tennis, injuries forced Matsuoka to consider other options, with her experience in constructing a tennis-playing robot helping her get a Ph.D at MIT. After helping to develop a robotic arm called the BarrettHand, she moved on to spend ten years at Carnegie Mellon University and the University of Washington in Seattle as a professor of robotics, at one point teaching Nest co-founder Matt Rogers.

Matsuoka's robotics background and work in neurorobotics, as well as experience developing the UI and learning algorithms for Nest products are likely to help her in the new role at Apple, where she will be reporting directly to COO Jeff Williams.

[Inkling]

Is it just my imagination, or has the push for more women in high-technology meant in practice more attractive and relative young women moving into executive positions? Yoky Matsuoka certainly fits that pattern. I'm not arguing that she's not talented. She certainly is. I just wonder why the selection process seems to favor talent and attractiveness. Most of the women I've worked under who're in management in less high-tech filelds tended to be older and—should I say—rather stout. Desk work tends to do that to you, particularly when you move past forty. Were I one of them, I'd be getting a bit ticked off.

[Charles Martin]

I see the War on Facts continues unabated.

Ms. Matsuoka is 44. Dame Angela Ahrendts is 55.

VP Lisa Jackson is 54.

[PolyEx]

I build robots, that should qualify me to design health applications. Apple is slowly going brain dead.

[Mike Wuerthele]

It doesn't seem like a good fit at first glance, no.

But, if she's looking at integrating robotics and prosthetics with iOS? That's a different matter. We'll see how it goes.

[Steve Wilkinson]

Let's hope she's not the one who decided to use a transistor in the Nest thermostat instead of a relay. Or, to push firmware updates mid-winter.