OpenAI's IO Project is working on a stand-alone AI device, but it told a US trademark court that the first product will not be a wearble or earbud.
This comes after a trademark dispute was raised by similarly-named company iyO.
Former Apple design chief Jony Ive's mysterious OpenAI device just got slightly less mysterious.
A trademark dispute between OpenAI and the Google-backed tech startup iyO has revealed several details about the first device OpenAI intends to launch.
The seemingly now-scrapped IO brand has revealed in legal documents that its debut product is not in the same space as iyO's – it is not an earbud, therefore.
According to TechCrunch, IO's chief hardware officer Tang Tan – another ex-Apple exec – told the court that the future OpenAI product is "not an in-ear device, nor a wearable device". Rather, it's a product that OpenAI's Sam Altman says "fits in your pocket or sits on your desk", and its design hasn't been finalised yet. It's apparently at least a year away from being announced or released.
The IO team was the subject of a near-$6.5 billion acquisition by OpenAI, and it's now going to be folded into the wider OpenAI organisation to work on AI-related hardware.
So what is OpenAI making?
Jonathan Ive's AI device: what it isn't
There's an awful lot of noise here and precious little signal, which is perhaps a pretty apt metaphor for the AI bubble.
OpenAI published and then unpublished marketing materials and a promo video featuring Jony Ive and Sam Altman bigging up AI. That's because the IO brand name is now subject to a judicial restraining order while the trademark dispute goes through the court.
The startup iyO claims that IO is infringing its trademark – and while IO/OpenAI claim their first product isn't an in-ear device, Tang Tan and other team members did meet with iyO to discuss the firm's tech.
The iyO One is a $999 Wi-Fi / $1,199 Wi-Fi + LTE in-ear headphone that iyO describes as "the world's first audio computer". It is currently taking deposits for pre-orders.
According to emails from iyO, OpenAI's people were particularly interested in the ear scanners that iyO users to investigate its customers' ear canals. It seems that OpenAI also considered buying a database of ear scans from iyO as "a helpful starting point on ergonomics."
However, IO/OpenAI is adamant that a custom-fit ear-based device isn't on the cards, at least for the first device.
