Apple Inc. has long been regarded as a bastion of stability in Silicon Valley, but the company is now experiencing its most significant executive exodus in decades, with senior leaders and critical engineers leaving in succession.

In just the past week, the heads of Apple's artificial intelligence and interface design teams departed. The company subsequently announced the impending exits of its general counsel and government affairs chief. All four executives reported directly to CEO Tim Cook, signaling an unusually large-scale leadership shakeup.

More changes may be forthcoming. According to people familiar with the matter, Johny Srouji, senior vice president of hardware technologies and one of Apple's most respected executives, recently informed Cook he's seriously considering leaving soon. The architect of Apple's custom silicon initiative has told colleagues he would join another company if he ultimately departs.

Meanwhile, AI talent is flowing to tech rivals—Meta Platforms Inc., OpenAI, and various startups have been poaching Apple engineers. This could hinder Apple's efforts to catch up in artificial intelligence, an area where the company has struggled to make breakthroughs.

Internally, some departures have caused deep concern. Cook is attempting to stem further attrition by offering more attractive compensation packages to key personnel. In other cases, executives are simply reaching retirement age. Nevertheless, the cumulative effect represents a troubling brain drain.

While Cook maintains that Apple is building its most innovative product pipeline ever—expected to include foldable iPhones and iPads, smart glasses, and robotics—the company hasn't launched a successful new product category in a decade. This makes Apple vulnerable to poaching by more agile competitors with stronger AI development capabilities.

Apple declined to comment.