Apple to shut key AI team in big reshuffle, several employees could lose job

Apple is shutting a 121-person team responsible for improving Siri that could put many employees at risk of termination, Bloomberg has reported.  

The team based out of San Diego has been asked to move to Austin and merge with the Texas portion of the same team.

Apple has reportedly told employees that they have until the end of February to decide if they will relocate. If they don’t, the workers will be terminated on April 26.

The group has offices in China, India, Ireland and Spain. 

According to the Bloomberg report, an Apple spokeswoman has confirmed the decision, saying the company is bringing its “Data Operations Annotations teams in the US together at our campus in Austin, where a majority of the team is already based.” 

The move could lead to several dozen workers leaving the company. Apple, which had 161,000 employees as of September, has mostly managed to avoid layoffs since the pandemic — in contrast with most of its tech peers.