MetaDesign London is believed to be in dispute with William Owen, who was appointed as head of research last August.
Owen is thought to have left MetaDesign two months ago.
A prolific design writer and business consultant, Owen had worked with the group since 1997 on a consultancy basis.
Although the exact nature of the dispute is not known, it calls into question Owen’s own role, which principally included research for identity projects and business consultancy. He was also working with MetaDesign Berlin on group-wide business strategy.
MetaDesign declines to comment on the situation, and Owen himself could not be located as Design Week went to press.
MetaDesign has undergone something of a restructure in the last four or five months, with the addition of a layer of project managers to improve the management of bigger projects.
Lykke Sternswärd, formerly at Wolff Olins; Andrew Croasdale and Karin Loglisci, both formerly at Siegal & Gale NY; and Karen Baggaley have joined as project managers. They have been joined in recent weeks by two designers, Nick Jones from Addison and Alec Law from Intro, and consultant Giles Rollestone.
MetaDesign, founded by the typographer Erik Spiekermann in Berlin, has three offices in London, San Francisco and Berlin.
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