Tim Cook approved big AI investment in 2023, but Luca Maestri slashed it: NYT

The behind the scenes journalistic recaps of Apple’s AI drama continues today at The New York Times. And in this latest report, blame for Apple’s struggles to compete in AI is assigned to a surprising source: Luca Maestri and budget. Maestri scaled GPU purchase plans way back in early 2023, harming Apple’s AI efforts Today Tripp Mickle at The New York Times has published a wide-ranging report outlining Apple’s struggles in AI, Siri, the Vision Pro, and more. It covers much of the same ground as yesterday’s The Information report, but there is an especially interesting new tidbit around Apple’s slow AI start. John Giannandrea, Apple’s AI head, reportedly sought approval in early 2023 to upgrade the company’s GPU arsenal and faced some pushback. Tripp Mickle writes at The New York Times: At the time, Apple’s data centers had about 50,000 GPUs that were more than five years old — far fewer than the hundreds of thousands of chips being bought at the time by A.I. leaders like Microsoft ... Read full article.