Major foreign media reported that Senior Vice President John Giannandrea, who has led Apple's artificial intelligence (AI) business for seven years, will step down early next year.
Major U.S. business outlets including CNBC reported on the 1st (local time) that Apple said Giannandrea will relinquish his role overseeing AI strategy and retire in the spring next year. Amar Subramanya, who worked as a vice president in charge of AI at DeepMind and Microsoft (MS), has been chosen as his successor.
While Giannandrea reported directly to CEO Tim Cook, Subramanya, as vice president in charge of AI, will report to Craig Federighi, senior vice president of software engineering. He will lead teams responsible for foundation models, research, and AI safety. Other teams under Giannandrea will move under Chief Operating Officer (COO) Sabih Khan and others. Foreign media interpreted this as Apple abandoning a structure where the AI group operated as a standalone organization and moving to build an integrated system with development.
Giannandrea will remain with the company as an adviser to help with the transition. A former Google executive, Giannandrea joined Apple in 2018 and has overseen AI, including the Siri voice assistant. Apple had planned to roll out Siri as a personalized AI, but has now delayed its launch.
CNBC viewed the reshuffle as coming while Apple faces assessments that it lags competitors in AI. It also called it the most notable reorganization within Apple's AI group since last year's launch of the AI system "Apple Intelligence."