Amar Subramanya has been appointed as Apple’s new Vice President of AI, replacing John Giannandrea who will remain as an advisor before retiring.
Subramanya previously served at Microsoft as Corporate Vice President of AI and, before that, spent 16 years at Google where his roles included Head of Engineering for the Gemini assistant and involvement in research on Search, YouTube, Android, and other large-scale AI/ML systems.
Having earned a Bachelor of Engineering in Electrical, Electronics, and Communication from Bangalore University, Subramanya went on to complete a PhD in Computer Science at the University of Washington where he focused on machine learning, large-scale systems, and natural language processing (NLP).
He worked as a software engineer in his early career and undertook research into semi-supervised learning, speech recognition, multilingual NLP, and audio-visual speech enhancement.
At Google, Subramanya gained experience in turning advanced AI research into consumer-facing products – including multimodal AI systems, assistant technologies (Gemini), large language models, and speech and voice technologies.
His short tenure at Microsoft involved foundational work on model development for enterprise and Cloud-integrated AI applications.
His role at Apple will see him lead “critical areas” that include Apple’s foundational models, machine learning research, and AI safety. Ultimately, he will help Apple accelerate its AI efforts – especially in bringing about advanced, integrated AI, which includes the next-gen version of the company’s intelligent assistant.
Apple has been criticised lately for its delay in rolling out AI features, most notably its revamped Siri, and it’s seriously lagging behind its competitors.
Subramanya’s appointment highlights the company’s aim to accelerate its AI roadmap and, given his background, he may lead the company down an even more ambitious road.
