Sam Altman is joining forces with design guru Jony Ive and Laurene Powell Jobs to build a new AI device company

Source: Business Insider

According to The Times, Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky arranged for Altman and Ive to meet last year. Airbnb had engaged Ive's design firm, LoveFrom, to work on several projects. Ive started LoveFrom in 2019 after nearly 30 years at Apple, where he led design efforts for the iMac, iPod, iPhone, iPad, and the Apple Watch.

Ive and Altman met several times for dinner, where they discussed the potential of launching a new AI-centered computing device, per The Times. Eventually, they agreed to build it together. Altman's new venture has been raising money privately, and has taken funds from both Ive and Emerson Collective, an impact investing and philanthropy firm founded by Powell Jobs. According to The Times, the startup is on track to raise up to $1 billion in start-up funding by the end of 2024.

"Smartphones are great. I have no interest in trying to go compete with a smartphone. It's a phenomenal thing at what it does," Sam Altman said.

"But I think it's well worth the effort of talking about or thinking about what we can make now that before we had computers that could think, or computers that could understand whatever you wanna call, was not possible. And if the answer is nothing, it would be a little bit disappointing."

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