Report: Apple Bleeding Talent to OpenAI

[vantelimus]

It is interesting to see so much speculation about what a handful of executive departures at Apple supposedly signals. Very few people outside a company understand the internal incentives or the politics that shape these decisions. Interpreting every exit as a sign of company crisis is extreme.

A more plausible explanation is that Apple has entered a leadership-transition period. If the rumors of Tim Cook’s retirement next year have any basis, then it is entirely expected that senior executives (from the C-suite through the VP layer) would reassess their positions. Executive turnover during succession planning is common. A wise executive will prefer to act proactively rather than wait to be forced into reactive decisions later. Thus, the uncertainty leads people to secure their standing, pursue new opportunities, or time retirements. It does not necessarily signal organizational dysfunction.

 

[turbineseaplane]

Interpreting every exit as a sign of company crisis is extreme.

If the SVP of Hardware Tech leaves, I don't know how anyone could downplay the impact of such a loss.

(Johny Srouji)

 

[canukstorm]

And it looks like that one successful thing that Tim Cook did (building a formidable ecosystem around the iPhone and turning Apple into a multi-trillion dollar company) more than offsets all his other “failures” combined.

No, it doesn't because he's sacrificed Apple's future for the interests of shareholders today.

 

[JMalone]

1. The know nothing experts on AI in this discussion don’t know the difference between a voice assistant (Siri, Alexa, etc) and a language model (Foundation model, etc).

2. Meta and OpenAI are throwing around billions of investor money at talent, but they aren’t actually making much use of them. The metaverse is still garbage, Meta’s top AI scientist is giving up and doesn’t believe in language models, and ChatGPT is still just as annoying as last year.

3. Apple could throw billions around to retain talent but they don’t need to. Every Tom, Dick and Harry has been studying machine learning for the last 8 years and there’s plenty of new talent looking for jobs.

So use your heads guys and don’t be one of those people who uncritically read media hyperbole articles full of complete rubbish.

 

[vantelimus]

If the SVP of Hardware Tech leaves, I don't know how anyone could downplay the impact of such a loss.

(Johny Srouji)

First, this is a rumor, but let's treat it as fact. He announced to Cook his intent to leave and find a position at another company. He could be sincere and want to move on. He might see Apple's future development as just not that interesting to him. Or he could be trying a power play to increase and/or secure his position in a post-Cook Apple.

If he really wants to leave and isn't just playing politics, he is doing so for his own reasons, not because Apple is in trouble. There are few companies Srouji can move to laterally. He could be considering an EVP position at Google, Microsoft, Amazon, Meta, or Nvidia. Or, the typical pattern for someone at his level, he might be looking at CEO or COO positions. There's not much room to move up when you are an SVP.

Yes, one could downplay his loss. There are no irreplaceable people in a competently managed company. Apple’s silicon success is built on a large, deep bench. Losing an SVP is not losing the architecture team, verification team, physical design team, or toolchain. Srouji is a manager, not an architect. His leadership may be gone, but his roadmap, the VPs, and the rest of the team are still there. The "Great Man Theory" works well for stories about 19th century robber barons, but it isn't supported by 20th-century organizational science. Apple survived the loss of Jobs (twice), Fadell, Forstall, Ive, etc.

 

[Fraserpatty]

I call this mass exodus “Siri’s Revenge”. Shouldn’t have ignored her for so many years. You can only neglect a woman for so long before she starts plotting to take you down.

 

[dwaite]

I definitely hope they are, but that’s my point: if they are developing new cool stuff they should have plenty of exciting work internally and not just boring maintenance stuff.

My view on the Vision Pro is that the concept is very promising and the same OS would be very successful on smaller and lighter hardware. But IMO the 2000s era Apple would have kept it as a prototype for longer until they can miniaturise the hardware more to make it more comfortable to wear, and produce it for a cheaper price. As it is, it undoubtedly is one of the worse product line launch they have had in a long time, because of a combination of high price, poor long term confort, and lack of sufficient use cases for the general public (reading online feedback, it seems that a significant proportion of purchasers end up using it less and less even though the paid a high price and were initially enthusiastic about it, while I would argue for most other major product lines they launched since the iPod an overwhelming majority early adopters did stick to using the product and even increased their usage over time).

The Vision Pro isn't a miss though - they didn't release a $3500 "Pro" device with the idea that it was targeting the general public. The lack of a general public audience means there's a lack of generalized software development for it.

But there is plenty of specialized development - see https://www.apple.com/business/enterprise/apple-vision-pro/

The headset represents Apple's MVP. Other companies figured they would get there in five years because components are too expensive, and that they would fund development by targeting consumer market games. Apple decided to start on the high end with business applications where the hardware capabilities make the price point compelling, and expand as the price moved down.

People complaining about Apple not paying VR game studios for exclusives or coming out with a steady stream of immersive content might not have understood the priorities of the product.

To a lesser degree this happened with the Pro Display XDR - it was not meant to be the display you bought if you wanted something to match your Apple laptop, it was primarily meant as an alternative to $11k+ reference displays for professional (often field) photo and video work. The difference is you didn't rely on another party to provide support for their apps running on a Pro Display XDR - ignoring its target demographic and resulting quirks, it was still a screen.

Now this does all get confounded by Apple selling the "vision" of the product line alongside the actual current product, including consumer features like spatial photos. But again, I don't think there was any intention on Apple's part of targeting the device for say - people who want the best device to capture 3D video of their child's birthday party (and the iPhone is arguably better device for that even when ignoring price).

Thats why I say it wasn't a miss - there were a few professional/enterprise/industrial markets where it made sense, and those markets are evaluating/investing in the device.

 

[stevodotorg]

Hot take: Apple buys OpenAI.