Apple to strip not-so-secret robotics unit from struggling AI chief John Giannandrea

Apple Park in Cupertino, California
Apple will transfer its not-so-secret robotics unit from the oversight of its struggling AI chief, John Giannandrea, to the hardware division later this month, sources say, marking another restructuring as the company’s AI challenges mount. Mark Gurman reports for Bloomberg News that the robotics unit will be placed under Senior Vice President John Ternus, who oversees hardware engineering.
Mark Gurman for Bloomberg News:
‎

The pending shift will mark the second major project to be removed from Giannandrea in the past month: The company stripped the flailing Siri voice assistant from his purview in March. The changes are part of a broader effort to catch up in artificial intelligence, a field where Apple has fallen behind tech peers such as Alphabet Inc.’s Google and OpenAI.
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.
For Giannandrea, the switch will mark yet another demotion of sorts in the wake of major delays to key Siri features and a tepid response to the Apple Intelligence platform. He has now lost hundreds of engineers just this year — to Ternus, Rockwell and software chief Craig Federighi — after Cook lost faith in his ability to execute on new product development…
The AI and machine learning group, mocked by some employees as “AI/MLess,” has been reeling for months after multiple delays to promising Siri features. People within Apple also have complained about a lax attitude that has slowed down engineering and the development of new initiatives. In an all-hands meeting last month, Apple’s former head of Siri under Giannandrea — Robby Walker — called the situation “ugly” and “embarrassing.”
Giannandrea hasn’t given his team any indication that he is planning to leave soon, but the continued shift of responsibilities has raised the prospect that the company may be preparing for a world without the executive at the helm of its AI efforts.

‎
MacDailyNews Take: As we wrote over a year ago in March 2024:
Apple pays and has been paying John Giannandrea, Senior Vice President of Machine Learning and AI Strategy, millions upon millions of dollars for years. WTF of any import does he really do? WTF of any import has he really delivered? Have you used Siri lately? Yup, it’s still a steaming pile of dogshit.
Where’s Apple’s generative AI, John? “Too hard; too late; look for partners; gimme my paycheck and stock options.”
AAPL shareholders need to start asking real questions of these executives, especially those who are supposedly in charge of Apple’s “AI Strategy,” when the company clearly has none. How about some accountability for once?

‎
Please help support MacDailyNews — and enjoy subscriber-only articles, comments, chat, and more — by subscribing to our Substack: macdailynews.substack.com. Thank you!
Support MacDailyNews at no extra cost to you by using this link to shop at Amazon.
The post Apple to strip not-so-secret robotics unit from struggling AI chief John Giannandrea appeared first on MacDailyNews.