Apple’s Product Roadmap Reportedly Includes Camera-Equipped Watch
Apple is reportedly working on a new version of its Watch that includes a camera.
As Bloomberg News reported Sunday (March 23), the camera would help the watch see the outside world and use artificial intelligence (AI) to provide relevant information.
These watches are likely still generations away from hitting stores, writes Bloomberg’s Mark Gruman, but are on the company “roadmap,” with plans to add cameras to both the standard Series and Ultra Apple Watch models.
But each watch would have a different camera set-up, the report added. In the Series watch model, the camera would be inside the display, as with the front-facing lens on an iPhone. With the Ultra version of the watch, the camera lens would sit at the side of the watch near the crown and button.
This way, an Ultra user could point their wrist at something to scan an object, while Series wearers would have to flip over their wrists. Gruman added that it’s likely the watch cameras would not support FaceTime, as the screens are too small for adequate video-conferencing.
Meanwhile, PYMNTS wrote last week about Apple’s struggles to catch up with its rivals on the AI front, with Amazon’s Alexa, Google’s Gemini for Android devices, and Samsung’s Galaxy AI all ahead in integrating more advanced AI features.
The company told Reuters recently that upgrades to its Siri AI assistant would be delayed until this year after promising those enhancements for 2025.
Robby Walker, head of Siri at Apple, has said that delays and missteps by Siri were “ugly” especially after aggressively advertising its capabilities, according to a recent Bloomberg report.
“It is a remarkable fall from grace for Siri that has culminated in a rare move by Apple: demoting the executive in charge,” PYMNTS wrote.
Apple CEO Tim Cook reportedly removed AI head John Giannandrea, the former head of search and AI at Google, from running Siri operations, replacing him with Vision Pro creator Mike Rockwell.
According to Siri co-designer Luc Julia, Apple’s obsession with perfection is likely hindering efforts to launch an improved version of Siri faster.
“They are falling behind because of this fear of not being perfect,” Julia told PYMNTS in an interview this month.
He noted that Siri was not created at Apple but rather by SRI International, directed by Julia. Apple later acquired Siri in 2010, and only after the intervention of one legendary executive.
“Only one guy wanted it,” Luc recalled. “It was Steve Jobs.”
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