There is life beyond the iPhone, the iPad and the Mac. Meanwhile, Apple is betting on Vision Pro, the mixed and augmented reality viewer that has been on sale in the US for a few months. Then, at least according to a Bloomberg report, it is starting to explore the field of home robotics.
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It’s too early to know if Cupertino will really revolutionize this hitherto little-known sector, but in the meantime the usually well-informed Mark Gurman has revealed some very interesting details about a secret project already underway in Cupertino.
Apple engineers are testing a mobile robot that can follow users around their homes, said insiders who asked not to be identified. The project is still in an early stage and Apple has obviously chosen not to make any comments on the matter.
Another project, however, would be at a more advanced stage, so much so that it would have been included in Apple’s roadmap several times already, only to be eliminated. It would be a smart display similar to an iPad, but with a robotic arm that moves it, causing it to mimic the head movements of a person in a FaceTime session, such as nodding. It would also have the ability to precisely address a single person in the crowd during a video call,” writes Gurman. He also points out that an Apple job advert openly mentions next-generation products that use robotics and artificial intelligence, so there are already external signs of life for the department.
Recently, news emerged that plans to produce an electric car were abandoned, an idea that ended a decade of planning without ever getting off the ground. Apple is known to have shifted human resources previously assigned to this division towards generative artificial intelligence projects. Currently, the focus appears to be on the development of robots, an area of interest that involves Apple’s hardware engineering division along with the team specializing in artificial intelligence and machine learning.
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