Siri Management Team Gets Overhaul After Apple Intelligence Failure

[MacRumors]

New Siri lead Mike Rockwell is overhauling the Siri management team in order to step up development on Apple Intelligence features, reports Bloomberg. He is demoting or replacing the managers who previously worked on Siri after the Apple Intelligence features demonstrated at WWDC 2024 failed to launch as expected.

Rockwell, who worked on the Vision Pro software, took over the Siri team in March, with former Siri chief John Giannandrea being reassigned to artificial intelligence research. Rockwell is replacing Siri managers with members of the Vision Pro software group, while also restructuring Siri teams that handle speech, understanding, performance, and user experience.

Longtime Vision Pro engineering lead Ranjit Desai will oversee Siri engineering, including the platform and systems groups. Vision Pro senior director Olivier Gutknecht will lead the team that designs the Siri user experience, and Vision Pro engineering director Nate Begeman and Core OS senior director Tom Duffy will work on Siri's underlying architecture.

Employees were told that the management overhaul would help Apple reach its Siri development goals, as the additions to the team are considered some of Apple's top software engineering talent, according to Bloomberg.

Rockwell is still overseeing the development of visionOS while he works on Siri, while the Vision Pro hardware team continues to report to John Ternus. Teams that were led by the executives moving to the Siri team will be overseen by Geoff Stahl, who has worked for Rockwell for years.

Under Rockwell's lead, Apple is rearchitecting Siri to use an LLM-based system that will streamline the personal assistant's underlying technology and outward-facing capabilities. To ensure that Siri's planned functionality for integrating more extensively with apps is ready to go on time, Apple plans to work with third-party app developers.

Article Link: Siri Management Team Gets Overhaul After Apple Intelligence Failure

 

[dannyyankou]

Isn’t this like their 3rd overhaul in 2 months?

 

[Andres Cantu]

I don’t think the management team is the only thing that needs restructuring…

 

[ApostolisApo]

Cue the ignorant reactions "LOL did they assign the folks from Apple's biggest flop in recent history to fix Siri?".
If you try to explain to them that awesome tech does not guarantee commercial success their heads will explode á la Scanners...

 

[filmantopia]

As a regular Vision Pro user, I absolutely believe in Rockwell. He's an innovator, and I believe knows what Siri needs to finally get on the right track.

 

[madquack]

I'll believe that when me 💩💩💩turns purple and smells like rainbow sherbet!

 

[MrENGLISH]

Siri has been a broken promise since 2011.

 

[iToph]

I said it before and i say it again: the CEO rank needs a shake up.

 

[GMShadow]

Cue the ignorant reactions "LOL did they assign the folks from Apple's biggest flop in recent history to fix Siri?".
If you try to explain to them that awesome tech does not guarantee commercial success their heads will explode á la Scanners...

They also can't grasp that a product Apple had zero ability (or plans) to manufacture more than hundreds of thousands of units a year was never intended to have an iPad-like sales curve.

 

[Imperial926]

Thing is, maybe they've realised that it's hard to raise present day AI above the simplistic c*** most companies do with it as of now. Then there's the privacy element. I think Apple are between a rock and a hard place. It doesn't really bother me as of now because of my first point. I'm an interested onlooker who might take all this seriously once I find the elements of AI that match my needs.

 

[dbc34]

Sounds like the previous manager John G went to macro data refinement.

 

[The Barron]

As a famous NFL quarterback from KC said, "I'll see it when I believe it!"

 

[smithrh]

Isn’t this like their 3rd overhaul in 2 months?

No, this is clarification of what's been going on. You've heard about it several times, for sure.

 

[richpjr]

I said it before and i say it again: the CEO rank needs a shake up.

He needs to stop his obsession with the Vision Pro and focus on other things.

 

[Zapski]

Siri can set a timer. It’s already doing everything I need.

 

[Aeronauts]

All I really need to know is when is it going to be fixed and fully working.

 

[Gunner49]

Siri, unfortunately, will be a PR nightmare for Apple if they don't get this right. Hopefully, this shake-up should reset priorities and expectations of what the product should look like and deliver.
I mean, one can hope, innit?

 

[bluecoast]

Siri can set a timer. It’s already doing everything I need.

That's the only thing that Siri can do correctly.

 

[HarryPot]

They need to make an AI that matches ChatGPT.
Otherwise, it will always feel useless.

And we all know they will never make a ChatGPT alternative for privacy reasons. So, we are stuck with useless AI from Apple. Eventually, the way Apple is lacking in innovation will catch up with them and a new player will arise with better hardware and better software.

I currently use ChatGPT daily. If Apple had an alternative I would switch instantly, and I think many more people would also switch.

 

[SIGSEGV1]

This is definitely unrelated to struggling to be the next Apple CEO. And Siri will undoubtedly be less stupid and search web less.

 

[MrGimper]

And they sacked Forstall for maps 🤣

Siri, Apple Intelligence and Vision Pro are a cluster compared.

 

[vantelimus]

He needs to stop his obsession with the Vision Pro and focus on other things.

What obsession on Vision Pro? He just took the leader and best engineering managers on the Vision OS project and moved them to Siri. This definitely doesn't sound like Vision Pro obsession. It sends a signal to the market that Vision will eventually be orphaned. If that's not what they intended to convey, then they should actively find some way to reassure the market. Releasing Apple Vision Pro II (i.e. an AVP with an M5 processor) isn't sufficient.

 

[zombierunner]

Bring back Scott Forstall 😅

 

[rp2011]

I think this is a good call, especially for AI in general. Having the people involved with Vision Pro work on Siri may give Apple a leg up, as AI is still missing this vital aspect in understanding the world around it. And having the engineers responsible in both may help Apple's overall AI capabilities. They need to be ready with hardware and software for the AI era.

 

[GMShadow]

He needs to stop his obsession with the Vision Pro and focus on other things.

Posts from 2007 complaining that Leopard was delayed due to "wasting time on the iPhone".