Apple Merging Teams

Apple  is creating a new AI/ML team that brings together

its Core ML and Siri teams under one leader in John

Giannandrea.

Apple confirmed this morning that the combined Artificial

Intelligence and Machine Learning team, which houses Siri,

will be led by the recent hire, who came to Apple this year after

an eight-year stint at Google, where he led the Machine Intelligence,

Research and Search teams. Before that he founded Metaweb

Technologies and Tellme.

The internal structures of the Siri and Core ML teams will remain

the same, but they will now answer to Giannandrea. Apple’s

internal structure means that the teams will likely remain

integrated across the org as they’re wedded to various projects,

including developer tools, mapping, Core OS and more. ML is

everywhere, basically.

In the early days, John was a senior engineer at General Magic,

the legendary company founded by Apple team members in 1989,

including Andy Hertzfeld, Marc Porat and Bill Atkinson. That company,

though eventually a failure, generated an incredible number of

technology breakthroughs, including tiny touchscreens and software

modems. General Magic also served as an insane incubator and

employer of talented people; at one point Susan Kare, Tony Fadell,

Andy Rubin, Megan Smith and current Apple VP of Technology Kevin

Lynch all worked there.