Feed: Engadget is a web magazine with obsessive daily coverage of everything new in gadgets and consumer electronics
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Title: OpenAI's first device with Jony Ive reportedly won't be a phone or a
wearable

Date: Thu, 22 May 2025 13:00:24 +0000
Link: https://www.engadget.com/ai/openais-first-dev...

The first device OpenAI is putting out with Jony Ive won't be a phone or a
wearable and may not even have a screen at all, according to The Wall Street
Journal. OpenAI chief Sam Altman reportedly talked about the company's plans
to employees after announcing that it has purchased Ive's startup called io.
The Journal said Altman told employees that they have "the chance to do the
biggest thing [they've] ever done as a company."

Altman and Ive gave out clues for what the company's first device could be:
They said it will be fully aware of its environment and the user's
activities, that it will unobtrusive and could either be carried around in
one's pocket or placed on a desk. The executives also believe that it's bound
to become one of people's "core" devices after a laptop and a phone.
According to the Journal, it won't be a phone and that one of Ive's and
Altman's goals is to wean people off screens, which means it most likely
wouldn't come with a display. Altman reportedly said that it won't be a pair
of glasses, and Ive wasn't keen on building a product users can wear in the
first place.

Whatever the device is, they intend on guarding specifics until it's time to
release it in order to prevent their competitors from copying it. They're
hoping to launch their new AI device late next year and are hoping to ship
100 million units "faster than any company has ever shipped 100 million of
something new before." Ive's team, the Journal said, has been talking to
vendors that can mass produce the device over the past four months.

OpenAI apparently started working with Ive's startup a year-and-a-half ago.
The original plan was to have Ive's company build a product that uses
OpenAI's technology, but they realized that it could become the primary way
users will interact with OpenAI's generative AI models. And that is why
OpenAI ended up acquiring the startup founded by Apple's former chief design
officer for $6.5 billion. We'll have to wait and see whether the combination
of Ive's design and OpenAI's tech is compelling enough to convince people to
buy yet another device from a new category. A company called Humane, for
instance, tried and failed to get people to purchase the Ai Pin, which it
marketed "as a tiny replacement for smartphones." In February, the company
disconnected all the Pins it had sold, leaving customers without access to
all of its features.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at
https://www.engadget.com/ai/openais-first-dev...
wont-be-a-phone-or-a-wearable-130024787.html?src=rss

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