Apple AI chief exits

John Giannandrea, the Apple executive hired to lead its artificial intelligence push in 2018, is leaving the company this week after an extended advisory period. (macrumors.com) Apple had already announced on December 1, 2025 that Giannandrea was stepping down as senior vice president for machine learning and artificial intelligence strategy and would retire in spring 2026. Apple said Amar Subramanya joined as vice president of artificial intelligence, reporting to software chief Craig Federighi. (apple.com) 9to5Mac reported that Giannandrea stayed on in an advising role long enough for his final stock awards to vest, describing the period as “resting and vesting.” MacRumors, citing Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman, said his departure had become a prolonged exit rather than a sudden break. (9to5mac.com) The exit follows a year in which Apple’s most ambitious Siri upgrade slipped. On March 7, 2025, Apple said the “more personalized Siri” features it previewed at Worldwide Developers Conference 2024 would take longer than expected and would roll out in “the coming year.” (daringfireball.net) Those delayed features were supposed to make Siri more aware of a user’s personal context and able to take actions across apps, not just answer one-off questions. Apple’s own statement said the company had already added Type to Siri, product knowledge, and ChatGPT integration, but the deeper overhaul was not ready. (daringfireball.net) Apple then reshuffled the chain of command. Bloomberg reported on March 20, 2025 that Mike Rockwell, who had led Apple Vision Pro, was put in charge of Siri and that Siri was removed from Giannandrea’s organization and placed under Craig Federighi. (bloomberg.com) That was a sharp change from Giannandrea’s original brief at Apple. When Apple named him to its executive team on December 20, 2018, the company said he oversaw artificial intelligence and machine learning strategy across products and services, including Core Machine Learning and Siri. (apple.com) Apple’s December 2025 announcement showed how much of that portfolio had moved. The company said Subramanya would lead Apple Foundation Models, machine learning research, and artificial intelligence safety and evaluation, while other parts of Giannandrea’s organization would shift to Sabih Khan and Eddy Cue. (apple.com) Giannandrea came to Apple from Google in April 2018 and was quickly elevated to the executive team that December. Eight years later, his final week closes a chapter that began with Apple trying to catch up in artificial intelligence and ends with Siri, foundation models, and future Apple Intelligence work under new leaders. (apple.com; apple.com)