Siri logo. (Image source: little norweigan encyclopedia.)

How was Apple’s AI assistant Siri born? In order to create more efficient command chain decisions, researchers at the Department of Defense began working in the early 2000s on a project to reduce the need for large command structures. They reasoned that having a virtual assistant that could translate as well as assist in personalized decision-making could make structures more lightweight. The funding for this project largely went into project CALO (Cognitive Assistant that Learns and Optimizes). CALO eventually grew beyond work at the Department of Defense, and became a massive collaboration led by SRI International (a child organization of Stanford Research Institute). It included researchers from Carnegie Mellon University, the University of Massachusetts, and the Institute for Human and Machine Cognition, among others.

Together, these researchers worked together to create a state-of-the-art AI system. An offshoot of this AI was later commercialized as Siri Inc., which was purchased by Apple, and became the virtual assistant that many now use in their day to day lives.