In breaking news from Apple, the tech giant is working on its own AI-based chatbot, currently referred to as “Apple GPT”. According to reports, the company does not have solid plans yet to release the technology to the public.
As reported by Bloomberg, the chatbot uses its own large language model (LLM) framework named “Ajax”, running on Google Cloud and built with Google JAX, a framework created to accelerate machine learning research. Sources close to the company say that Apple has multiple teams working on the project, including addressing potential privacy implications.
While other tech giants like Microsoft and Google are rapidly releasing their own creative AI products for businesses and the general public, Apple has stood out by not participating in the game.
Although Apple prohibited its employees from using ChatGPT, Bloomberg reports that engineers internally used the chatbot powered by Ajax. Ajax was created to “unify machine learning development,” says Bloomberg.
Apple has been relatively quiet in the field of generative AI, although the company has been using AI in its software for a long time. Its most famous AI system is Siri, the voice assistant that helped drive the trend among tech companies, but critics argue that Siri still has a long way to go. To strengthen its efforts, Apple hired John Giannandrea, who previously led AI and search at Google, in 2018 to oversee Siri and its machine learning teams. According to Bloomberg, Giannandrea and Apple’s senior vice president of software engineering, Craig Federighi, lead Apple’s AI initiative.
In a recent interview with Good Morning America, Tim Cook said that AI technology is something Apple is “closely examining.” Cook also expressed concerns about AI products during the earnings call in May, stating that there are “a number of issues to sort out.” Other companies have begun working together to release different LLMs to startups and researchers. Meta announced on Tuesday that its LLaMA 2 LLM will be available on Microsoft’s Azure platform. Microsoft also operates OpenAI’s GPT model in its Bing search product.
Although Apple’s plans in the field of AI are still unclear, sources tell Bloomberg that Apple is looking for a “significant AI-related announcement” sometime next year.
We will continue to closely monitor the developments, and we invite you to follow us to stay updated on all the latest in the field of artificial intelligence.
