GeekWire is reporting that Apple has purchased a Seattle-based artificial intelligence (AI) firm called Turi. (Turi was formerly known as Dato and GraphLab.) “Sources close to the deal” tell the site that the purchase was in the neighborhood of $200 million. The report adds that the Turi staff are expected to stay in Seattle and to grow their office.
Turi makes several products that help developers incorporate AI, machine learning and predictive analytics into their apps. Those products include the Turi Machine Learning Platform, GraphLab Create, Turi Distributed and Turi Predictive Services. It was founded by Carlos Guestrin, a University of Washington professor who first launched the company’s technology as an open source project.
In response to the report, Apple released its standard statement, which says, “Apple buys smaller technology companies from time to time, and we generally do not discuss our purpose or plans.” Apple has recently acquired several startups focused on AI and machine learning.
