Apple has acquired another machine learning tech start-up as it continues its efforts to improve the quality of Siri and explore potential software advancements through data science and artificial intelligence.
News of the latest acquisition came from Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman, who said that Apple had recently confirmed the deal.
The Cupertino-based company told Gurman that it “buys smaller technology companies” when it sees the right opportunity, but added that it would not divulge its purpose or plans for buyouts.
Inductiv Inc., based in Canada, is certainly a low-key business as it does not have a digital presence at all outside of a few staff profiles on LinkedIn.
However, Apple appears to have been impressed by the company’s tech developments and more specifically, how it uses AI to correct data errors.
Inductiv was founded by academics based in the field of machine learning who graduated from Stanford and other universities from across the US.
“The engineering team from Waterloo, Ontario-based Inductiv joined Apple in recent weeks to work on Siri, machine learning and data science,” Gurman said this week.
Machine learning is central to the evolution of personal assistant Siri, and the Inductiv team should make it easier for Apple to analyse data and make improvements.
Apple has recently fallen behind its rivals in the AI assistant stakes.
Google Assistant and Amazon Alexa have come on leaps and bounds with the ability to make sense of natural language, and Apple now wants to make major strides in this area.
Inductiv is not the first AI or data company to have been acquired by Apple though.
The company concluded deals to bring virtual reality start-up NextVR, AI start-up Voysis and weather app Dark Sky on board earlier in the year.
They join companies that have been acquired by Apple since 2016, which include Perceptio, Turi, Tuplejump and Laserlike.