Giannandrea joins CuspAI in U.S. role

John Giannandrea, Apple’s former top artificial intelligence executive, has joined U.K. startup CuspAI in a part-time role focused on building out its U.S. operations. (upstartsmedia.com) Giannandrea left Apple this spring after the company said on December 1, 2025 that he would step down as senior vice president for machine learning and AI strategy and retire in spring 2026. (apple.com) Upstarts reported that Giannandrea will help CuspAI hire talent in the United States, open a Bay Area office, and work without a formal title for now. (upstartsmedia.com) (9to5mac.com) CuspAI is not building a chatbot or a coding assistant. It says its software is designed to discover new materials, using artificial intelligence to search for molecules and compounds with properties companies want. (cusp.ai) The company says it wants to speed up materials discovery from a process that can take years in a lab to one that can be narrowed down computationally in months. Its leadership page lists chief executive Chad Edwards, co-founder Max Welling, and advisers including Geoffrey Hinton and Yann LeCun. (cusp.ai) That pitch has drawn investors quickly. CuspAI announced a $30 million seed round in June 2024 led by Hoxton Ventures, Basis Set Ventures, and Lightspeed Venture Partners. (cdn.prod.website-files.com) By September 2025, CuspAI had raised a $100 million Series A co-led by New Enterprise Associates and Temasek, with backing from NVentures, Samsung Ventures, and Hyundai Motor Group. (businessweekly.co.uk) (startupmag.co.uk) Bloomberg reported on April 20 that CuspAI was in talks to raise at least $200 million more at a valuation above $1 billion. That makes Giannandrea’s arrival part of a broader push to expand beyond Cambridge and deepen its U.S. presence. (bloomberg.com) Giannandrea brings a résumé shaped by two of Silicon Valley’s biggest AI platforms. Before Apple hired him in 2018, he led search and AI work at Google; at Apple, he oversaw teams tied to Apple Foundation Models, search and knowledge, machine learning research, and AI infrastructure. (apple.com) Upstarts said he does not plan to work exclusively for CuspAI and is expected to advise several artificial intelligence startups. For CuspAI, the immediate assignment is more concrete: build a U.S. team and plant a flag in the Bay Area. (upstartsmedia.com)