Apple’s troubled AI chief is allegedly losing oversight of the robotics unit
Apple will allegedly strip its secret robotics unit from the purview of AI chief John Giannandrea after removing the Siri assistant from his command earlier.
“Apple plans to relocate the robotics team from John Giannandrea’s AI organization to the hardware division later this month, according to people with knowledge of the move,” said Mark Gurman on Bloomberg. The robotics unit will be allegedly led by Apple’s senior vice president of hardware engineering, John Ternus (you know him as one of the regular presenters in Apple’s sleek video announcements).
Apple poached John Giannandrea in 2018 from Google, where he oversaw its AI and search efforts. The blockbuster hire didn’t move the needle in terms of Apple’s AI efforts. Under Giannandrea’s leadership, Siri saw little progress while Apple fell behind rivals in the AI race, especially after OpenAI released ChatGPT.
Apple’s robotics unit is getting new leadership
I bet the worry about how investors might react is the only reason Tim Cook hasn’t fired Giannandrea following the Siri debacle. It looks like the company has opted to slowly phase him out. First, they took Siri from his purview and now the robotics unit. Giannandrea still leads Apple’s AI and machine learning efforts, but for how long?
Giannandrea, a former Google executive who serves as senior vice president of machine learning and artificial intelligence strategy, continues to run most of Apple’s AI efforts. And the change will give his group more time to focus on underlying artificial intelligence technology, the people said.
Giannandrea’s bio page on Apple’s website describes him as overseeing “the strategy for artificial intelligence and machine learning across the company and development of Core ML and Siri technologies.”
Every Apple user can see Giannandrea’s strategy at work whenever they fire up Siri or use search features in apps like App Store, Music and TV. Apple’s search algorithms still function in verbatim mode without taking misspellings into account.
Apple’s secretive robotics unit
Gurman says Apple’s robotics team is developing solutions to use AI to power devices, among other things. Led by former Apple Watch chief Kevin Lynch, the unit is also thought to be working on a tabletop robot with “an artificial limb to move around an iPad-like display.”
“For further in the future, the group has discussed building mobile machines, including a roaming robot similar to the Amazon Astro,” Gurman noted. “The products are designed to be telepresence devices, meaning they would let users videoconference with others.”
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