OpenAI Finally Takes on Apple

A few months ago, there were reports that Sam Altman is joining Jony Ive, the legendary iPhone designer to start their own AI hardware project for AI devices. Now, the move is reported to take further steps as both of the veterans have approached outgoing Apple executive Tang Tan, vice president of iPhone and watch design, to join the project.

According to reports, Tan will join LoveFrom, the company created by Ive in 2019, which is a design studio to create AI devices. Tan would lead the hardware engineering project as he has stepped down from the current position at Apple. People with knowledge of the matter said that his role is already divided with others at Apple, and he would leave by February. 

Apple has witnessed a significant departure of design expertise with Tan’s exit, highlighting a broader trend of talent leaving the company. Since 2019, approximately 14 individuals from Ive’s original team have departed, leaving only around half a dozen of the designers who were once under Ive’s supervision still employed at Apple.

Meanwhile, SoftBank CEO and investor Masayoshi Son is also involved in this new development and has held talks with both Altman and Ive about the idea, but it is unclear if Son will remain involved in the longer run.

It all makes sense for OpenAI

LoveFrom has successfully gathered a notable clientele, including prominent names like Airbnb Inc., Ferrari NV, and Moncler SpA. Additionally, the company had a three-year consulting deal with Apple, which concluded in 2022. Remarkably, over 20 former Apple employees are now part of LoveFrom’s team.

Though the plans for the exact form factor that LoveFrom is working on is unclear, speculations around a home device like an Alexa Mini, or something similar to Humane Ai are floating around. OpenAI’s technology and Ive’s hardware design prowess are bound to make something beautiful happen. 

For Altman, this decision of investing into other startups was one of the reasons that OpenAI’s board members were unhappy, which eventually led to him getting fired. Though now that he is back as the CEO, he wants people to be able to better use the company’s technology in different form factors. 

In 2020, Altman also invested $30 million in series A funding of Humane, which has announced its GPT-powered Ai Pin. One fascinating fact about Humane is that it was founded by former Apple employees Imran Chaudhari and Bethany Bongiorno. Imran spent over 20 years at Apple working on products like iPod, iPad and Apple Watch and iPhone.

Until the Humane Ai Pin was announced, Meta’s Ray-Ban seemed like a gadget of the future, that everyone would be wearing, and recording the world around them. But now, investing in a pair of glasses seems to be outdated altogether, and OpenAI knows that. 

Humane is not the only thing. OpenAI also recently partnered with WHOOP to introduce WHOOP Coach suggests that SoftBank might soon become part of OpenAI’s endeavours. Leveraging OpenAI’s latest technology, WHOOP Coach instantly generates personalised and conversational answers to your inquiries about health, fitness, and well-being.

OpenAI’s upgrades to GPT-4 with vision and audio capabilities all lead to this, and it makes sense for the company to embed this technology in a hardware device.

What about Apple?

In other news, OpenAI has also announced that it is planning to raise more funds at a valuation of $100 billion. This includes discussion with Abu Dhabi-based G42 chip venture fund. This along with the investment in RainAI for developing neuromorphic processing units, OpenAI is going all in on hardware. 

Altman’s plan is working out, meanwhile Apple is headed the OpenAI way and is increasingly focusing on building generative AI capabilities for its hardware. Most recently, Apple also approached news publications such as Conde Nast, NBC News, and IAC, to help them build Apple’s generative AI capabilities in a multiyear deal worth at least $50 million. 

The company also has been releasing open source projects for working AI on its silicon, which includes multimodal LLMs such as Ferret. It is clear that OpenAI is ready for the AI hardware challenge and Apple is ready with its generative AI capabilities on software. 

Right now, it seems that OpenAI and Altman, with Humane, LoveFrom, and all the new Apple employees on their team, have the upper hand over their competitors.