“Apple has acquired Laserlike, a small Silicon Valley-based machine learning startup, which could help strengthen the company’s artificial intelligence efforts, including its Siri virtual assistant,” Aaron Tilley reports for The Information.
“An Apple spokesperson confirmed the acquisition of the four-year-old startup, which was founded by three former Google engineers, Anand Shukla, Srinivasan Venkatachary and Steven Baker, and had raised more than $24 million from Redpoint Ventures and Sutter Hill Ventures, according to CrunchBase,” Tilley reports. “Terms of the deal could not be learned.”
Tilley reports, “Laserlike had built a smartphone app, now no longer available in Google and Apple’s mobile app stores, that let users follow topics in which they were interested, such as news, music, and sports.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Note: Last August, Mozilla debuted an experimental Firefox feature, the Advance web extension, that recommended content based on what the user is currently reading through the browser. The Advance web extension analyzed content on current active web pages to recommend related “read next” articles from other websites and offer recommendations based on users’ recent browsing history in a “for you” section. The extension was powered by Laserlike, the VC-funded, machine learning startup that Apple has now purchased.
More info here.
SEE ALSO:
Head of Apple’s Siri team apparently has been reassigned – February 4, 2019
AI guru John Giannandrea named to Apple’s executive team – December 20, 2018
Former Apple employees on Eddy Cue: Siri and Eddy were ‘a bad fit’ – September 5, 2018
Apple’s Siri improved by 11 percentage points in correct answers over the last 15 months – July 25, 2018
Apple combines machine learning and Siri teams under John Giannandrea – July 10, 2018
Apple’s ‘personal assistant activation’ patent application hints at improved Siri – May 10, 2018
iOS 11.4 will allow Siri to recognize AirPlay commands – May 3, 2018
iPhone X owners are extremely satisfied with basically everything except Siri – April 20, 2018
Apple’s Siri, HomePod and the voice assistant showdown – April 6, 2018
Apple’s A.I. efforts get shot of adrenaline with Giannandrea coup – April 6, 2018
A.I. defector gives Apple access to Google’s secrets – April 6, 2018
Gene Munster: Poaching AI chief John Giannandrea from Google a win for Apple – April 5, 2018
Apple hires Google’s A.I. chief to improve Siri – April 4, 2018
Apple hires Amazon A9 exec Stasior to run Siri unit – October 15, 2012
Feeding us what we are currently reading is one method to dumb down our explorations. It’s like “what’s trending,” just as dumbed down.