Apple’s former chief design officer, Jony Ive, is reportedly in discussions with OpenAI to construct the “iPhone of synthetic intelligence,” aided by over $1 billion in funding from Softbank CEO Masayoshi Son. In keeping with a brand new report by the Monetary Instances, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman is trying to make use of Ive’s design agency LoveFrom to develop OpenAI’s first client system, with the duo having mentioned what such a product would appear to be throughout brainstorming classes at Ive’s San Francisco studio. Information of the enterprise was first reported by The Info on Tuesday.

In keeping with three individuals acquainted with the plan, Ive and Altman are aiming to create a tool that gives a “extra pure and intuitive person expertise” to work together with synthetic intelligence. The duo have taken inspiration from how the touchscreen expertise on the unique iPhone helped revolutionize our interplay with the cell web. Son is providing funding for the trouble, and has reportedly pushed for chip design firm Arm (which Son holds a 90 p.c stake in) to play a central position.

Whereas Ive performed a pivotal position within the creation of the primary iPhone, the previous Apple designer has beforehand expressed considerations about smartphones inflicting compulsive conduct. In an interview with the Monetary Instances in 2018, Ive stated that Apple had a “ethical duty” to mitigate the addictive nature of its expertise, and that tech corporations ought to try to predict as many unintended penalties as doable when designing new merchandise. 

In keeping with the Monetary Instances’ sources, the venture with OpenAI may permit Ive to assist create an interactive computing system that’s much less reliant on screens. Altman already has some expertise with this due to his investments in Humane — a {hardware} and software program startup co-founded by ex-Apple staff — which is creating a screenless wearable AI system that’s designed to exchange smartphones.

The Altman, Ive, and Son venture remains to be in its early levels and several other totally different concepts for the system are nonetheless being thought-about. Whereas no deal has been confirmed and particulars surrounding the venture are slim, the discussions are stated to be “critical.”