John Giannandrea wasn't Apple's AI savior, and the company may be looking for a replacement

After a year of AI turmoil, Apple is reportedly considering internal and external candidates for the role that John Giannandrea presently holds.

In March, following the considerably poor handling of the Apple Intelligence rollout and the long-promised upgrade to Siri, Apple decided to shift AI lead John Giannandrea out of his position. Months later, and Apple is still trying to decide on a permanent replacement.

At the time, Apple Vision Pro chief Mike Rockwell was put in to manage Siri's development. It was a bet on technical expertise and experience in shipping new products, and his leadership skills, despite not having Giannandrea's background in AI.

But according to Bloomberg's "Power On" newsletter, he was a candidate for being Giannandrea's successor, but that has become a less likely prospect.

Rather than Rockwell, senior Apple executives are reportedly looking to other leaders in the AI field to become Giannandrea's replacement. A top candidate seems to be a senior AI executive at Meta.

Following a months-long overhaul of its AI division, it has shifted to create a Superintelligence Labs unit. That overhaul can be the catalyst Apple needs to hire some exiting employees from Meta for its own Apple Intelligence projects.

The external sourcing of a new leader is a role reversal for the two companies. For months, Meta has been hiring away AI-centric employees from Apple for its own teams.

This famously includes Ruoming Pang, the former head of Apple's foundational models team. Meta reportedly lured the AI executive away from Apple with a compensation package valued at over $200 million across several years.

Apple doesn't have to hire externally for the position. But an alleged need to catch up and an apparent lack of suitable candidates within its ranks are seemingly forcing Apple's hand in the matter.

With massive compensation packages flying around in the AI space, it has become an expensive exercise to hire candidates within the field. Arguably, it has also led to Apple's current position in losing many potential internal candidates for the role.