OpenAI and Jony Ive AI Gadget Struggles – Secret Personal Assistant Details

Its been reported that OpenAI and former Apple design chief Jony Ive are having some trouble with a secret AI device they are working on. The device is supposed to be a palm-sized personal assistant that can see and hear the world around you and respond to your requests. Sounds cool, but sources say they haven’t solved all the tech problems yet.

The Project So Far

OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, bought Ive’s company io for $6.5 billion back in May. But so far, details are super secret. People familiar with the plans say the device will be roughly the size of a smartphone, have microphones, cameras, and a speaker, and it can sit on a desk or be carried around. It’s supposed to be always on, learning from your environment to make its AI assistant smarter.

However, even with Ive designing the hardware — who helped make the iMac, iPod, and iPhone — there are problems with the software and infrastructure. One big issue is compute power. OpenAI already struggles to run ChatGPT for millions of users, and now they want to run it on a consumer device.

Other challenges include:

• Deciding the personality of the assistant
• Privacy concerns
• Budgeting for the computing power needed

The Personality Problem

People familiar with the project say they are trying to make the assistant feel like a friend, but not “your weird AI girlfriend.” It shouldn’t be too pushy, too sycophantic, or keep talking in loops. The goal is for it to be helpful but not annoying, which is surprisingly hard.

Apparently, OpenAI wants it to be better than Siri or Alexa, improving on the “smart speakers” of the past decade. But other AI gadgets have struggled — Friend, a pendant AI, was called creepy, and another device from Humane was scrapped.

Hiring and Hardware Efforts

OpenAI is hiring a lot of people for this project. Ive brought in more than 20 former Apple hardware employees, and OpenAI also poached some experts from Meta working on VR headsets and smart glasses. They are even working with Chinese contract manufacturers like Luxshare to build the device, though it might be assembled elsewhere.

The Big Picture

This gadget is part of OpenAI’s push into hardware, after recently becoming the most valuable private company in the world at $500 billion, surpassing SpaceX. The goal is to make a more useful AI assistant than what’s available today.

But with all the tech issues, personality debates, and compute challenges, it might take some time before we see this device hit the market. For now, fans and tech enthusiasts are left curious and excited about what OpenAI and Jony Ive are cooking up.

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