Apple Cuts Vision Pro Teams to Expand Siri AI Infrastructure
Apple is cutting more than 200 jobs across Vision Pro, Siri and Intelligent Systems Experiences as it redirects resources toward AI, Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman reports. He characterizes the Vision Pro reductions as a conventional retrenchment—including the elimination of its gaming-initiatives team and less in-house immersive-video production—while the software cuts are intended to make room for engineers building Siri’s new AI infrastructure, voice assistant and upgraded Apple Intelligence.
Apple is cutting discrete Vision Pro bets to make room for Siri AI infrastructure
Apple is cutting jobs across Vision Pro, Siri and Intelligent Systems Experiences, with more than 200 people affected, according to a Bloomberg News graphic shown with the report. Mark Gurman describes two distinct changes: a conventional retrenchment in parts of the Vision Pro organization, and software-engineering reductions intended to create roles for work on Siri’s new AI foundation.
The Vision Pro group, known as VPG, is facing what Gurman calls a “traditional layoff,” as Apple cuts teams and scales back particular work. Its gaming-initiatives team has been completely dismantled and laid off, he says.
Apple is also reducing its internal immersive-video operation. The group makes virtual-reality videos for Vision Pro, which Gurman calls one of the headset’s major selling points. Apple is cutting both jobs and investment there and plans to produce drastically fewer videos in-house, instead shifting more production to third parties.
The Siri and Intelligent Systems Experiences cuts serve a different function in Gurman’s account. Intelligent Systems Experiences integrates AI features through Apple’s operating systems and services; it and Siri are part of the software-engineering organization. Apple is eliminating roles there to open positions for people with skills suited to the underlying infrastructure for Siri AI.
They’re cutting jobs there as well to open up roles for people who can work on the new underlying infrastructure for Siri AI.
Gurman says the company is seeking to develop faster and recruit people more specifically focused on that infrastructure, a new voice assistant and upgraded Apple Intelligence, which he says launches in the fall. The trade-off is concrete: Apple is ending Vision Pro gaming work and reducing its own immersive-video production while opening software roles for the technical work behind Siri AI.
A small global foldable market is much larger in China
The foldable iPhone is the new-device prospect Gurman expects to do particularly well for Apple in China. Ed Ludlow describes it as a possible way to bring some “magic” back to Apple’s product story; Gurman’s rationale is the shape of the existing foldable market and the device’s status appeal in China.
Foldables account for about 1.5% of the global phone market, Gurman says. Their share in China is roughly twice that level, and he says the vast majority of foldable phones in use worldwide are in China.
Gurman sees foldables as a status symbol in China and believes Apple’s device will be successful there. His enthusiasm is also practical: the hardware would be small enough to fit in a pocket when closed, then unfold to about the size of an iPad Mini.
You have this small thing that can fit in your pocket and you open it up and it’s about the size of an iPad Mini.