Apple is increasingly turning its attention to artificial intelligence as it looks to compete with Google in the predicting what users want before they even ask.
Reuters reports that Apple is looking to hire at least 86 employees who will focus on machine learning, an area of artificial intelligence that is displayed in smartphones.
Apple was ahead of the game when it introduced Siri in 2011, but the likes of Google and Microsoft have since caught up. Even Facebook is starting to focus on this area, with the recent announcement of its M virtual assistant for Messenger.
But Apple’s strict stance on privacy could impede its attempts to embrace artificial intelligence, with machine learning relying entirely on collecting troves of data on what the user does.
Apple is reportedly scouring through PhD programs, posting job listings and increasing its AI team to help gain a foothold in this fiercely competitive field.
It’s an area that Apple still has much room to improve, and exactly how it plans to do so will probably become a bit clearer with the imminent announcement of the iPhone 7.
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Denham Sadler is a former editor of StartupSmart. He was previously a journalist at the publication and has worked as a freelancer for the Guardian, the Saturday Paper and the ABC. In his spare time he likes puns and jaffles.
