Inside Apple's Big Plan to Bring Generative AI To All Its Devices

An anonymous reader shares a report: Apple was caught flat-footed when ChatGPT and other AI tools took the technology industry by storm. But the company is now preparing its response and plans to develop features for its full range of devices. One of the most intense and widespread endeavors at Apple right now is its effort to respond to the AI frenzy sweeping the technology industry. The company has some catching up to do. Apple largely sat on the sidelines when OpenAI's ChatGPT took off like a rocket last year. It watched as Google and Microsoft rolled out generative AI versions of their search engines, which spit out convincingly human-like responses to users' queries. Microsoft also updated its Windows apps with smarter assistants, and Amazon unveiled an AI-enhanced overhaul of Alexa. All the while, the only noteworthy AI release from Apple was an improved auto-correct system in iOS 17.

Apple's senior vice presidents in charge of AI and software engineering, John Giannandrea and Craig Federighi, are spearheading the effort. On Cook's team, they're referred to as the 'executive sponsors' of the generative AI push. Eddy Cue, the head of services, is also involved, I'm told. The trio are now on course to spend about $1 billion per year on the undertaking. Giannandrea is overseeing development of the underlying technology for a new AI system, and his team is revamping Siri in a way that will deeply implement it. This smarter version of Siri could be ready as soon as next year, but there are still concerns about the technology and it may take longer for Apple's AI features to spread across its product line. Federighi's software engineering group, meanwhile, is adding AI to the next version of iOS. There's an edict to fill it with features running on the company's large language model, or LLM, which uses a flood of data to hone AI capabilities. The new features should improve how both Siri and the Messages app can field questions and auto-complete sentences, mirroring recent changes to competing services.

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