Apple has appointed Bengaluru-born AI expert Amar Subramanya as its new vice-president of artificial intelligence, marking a major strategic shift as it strengthens Apple Intelligence. Subramanya, who will take over from John Giannandrea, set to retire in spring 2026, will report to Craig Federighi and lead Apple’s work on foundation models, machine learning research, and AI safety. As part of the transition, portions of Giannandrea’s organisation will shift under COO Sabih Khan and services head Eddy Cue.
Apple just made a massive AI power move.
Amar Subramanya, the engineer who spent 16 years at Google building the backbone of Gemini and then jumped to Microsoft, is now the new Vice President of AI at Apple.John Giannandrea is stepping down and Apple replaced him with someone… pic.twitter.com/JvB8PMzgld
— Andy Parackal (@Andyparackal) December 3, 2025
Apple CEO Tim Cook welcomed Subramanya and stated, “AI has long been central to Apple’s strategy, and we are pleased to welcome Amar to Craig’s leadership team and to bring his extraordinary AI expertise to Apple.”
Who is Amar Subramanya?
Amar Subramanya brings over two decades of expertise in machine learning and large-scale AI systems to Apple, following senior roles at Google and Microsoft. He most recently served as corporate VP of AI at Microsoft, contributing to foundation models behind Copilot, and previously spent 16 years at Google, rising to VP of engineering and leading work on Gemini in collaboration with DeepMind. Apple says his deep technical background will be essential for its next phase of AI innovation.
Apple AI chief John Giannandrea is leaving the company. Amar Subramanya from Microsoft is joining to lead AI under Craig Federighi.
— Mark Gurman (@markgurman) December 1, 2025
Subramanya’s academic journey began at Bangalore University, where he studied electronics and communications engineering before completing a PhD in computer science at the University of Washington. His research focused on semi-supervised learning and graphical models, earning him a Microsoft Research Graduate Fellowship. He also co-authored a book in the field and worked across NLP, speech, and entity resolution. Early stints at IBM and Microsoft paved the way for his long tenure at Google.
Apple’s decision to hand Subramanya the reins of its AI leadership comes at a critical moment for the company. While rivals like Google, Microsoft, and fast-growing AI startups have surged ahead in generative AI and assistant capabilities, Apple has been criticised for moving too slowly. Siri, once groundbreaking, is now considered outdated compared to modern AI copilots integrated across platforms and businesses.
With Subramanya onboard, Apple is making clear its intention to accelerate progress while staying committed to privacy and on-device processing. His appointment signals a push toward faster, more ambitious AI development without compromising Apple’s responsible AI principles. As Apple put it, this transition marks “an exciting new chapter” in its journey to shape the future of AI for users globally.
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