Apple’s former VP of Industrial Design Jony Ive is working with ChatGPT maker OpenAI to make something vaguely described as the “iPhone of artificial intelligence,” according to reports from The Information and Financial Times. They reportedly received $1 billion in funding from Softbank CEO Masayoshi Son, so this is a serious project, but it’s still in the early stages of planning.
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The alleged concept behind this venture is give users a more natural and intuitive way of interacting with AI than what is currently available. Using ChatGPT on a laptop or an iPhone is perfectly fine, but that’s not what those devices were explicitly designed to do. Ive’s new project would theoretically involve hardware deeply entrenched with AI.
Citing people who are familiar with the matter, the Financial Times suggested that the end game is “create a way of interacting with computers that is less reliant on screens.” If that statement made your head spin, The Verge pointed to Humana’s screenless wearable AI gizmo as an example of displayless tech.
Ive left Apple in 2019 after nearly 30 years with the company. In case you aren’t aware, he was an important figure in the physical designs of devices like the iMac, the iPhone, the iPad, and other iDevices. He’s been floating around the last few years taking on projects here and there (he actually designed some Apple Watch watch faces after he left the company), but working with OpenAI on hardware would be arguably his most noteworthy effort since leaving the mothership.