The co-founder of Siri, the much acclaimed and the most loved application in the newly launched iPhone 4S, Dag Kittlaus, in an unexpected move has decided to quit the US technology giant, Apple, to pursue other projects and execute new entrepreneurial ideas.
According to AllThingsD, who first broke the news out stated -
There were several reasons for the departure, which was amicable and has been planned for a while, sources said. They included Kittlaus’ family being in Chicago, a desire to take time off and an interest in brainstorming new entrepreneurial ideas.
Kittlaus joined Apple as part of the company’s acquisition of the voice control firm for $200 million in April 2010. He founded the
company along with Adam Cheyer and Tom Gruber and served as Siri’s CEO since 2007. Earlier to that, Kittlaus was a resident at the Stanford Research Institute (SRI) and also worked at Motorola.
Kittlaus has updated his LinkedIn profile indicating that he is currently the Founding Advisor at Palindrome Advisors, which mainly partners with non-profits and NGOs to help them effectively communicate with their supporters and the public at large. The other two co-founders will remain Apple staff members, according to their LinkedIn profiles.
Siri is a voice-activated virtual personal assistant that was announced as an application on the iPhone 4S, enabling the user to give the iPhone commands, which it can execute and respond to. It helps the user to write and send text and e-mails, set reminders and alarm, schedule a meeting, browse the Internet and even answer sensitive and funny
questions.
The voice assistant was originally a free downloadable app from the Apple App Store for the iPhone. After announcing that the Siri is included with the iPhone 4S, Apple took down the application from the App Store. A developer of 9to5Mac reported that he was able to port Siri back to iPhone 4. However, the performance and quality was not impressive.
Earlier this week, a major flaw was identified with the Siri system by a security blogger, which involved anyone to access the iPhone even when it is locked. This security loophole allowed the unauthorized users to bypass the passcode lock to perform tasks like making calls and sending messages with the help of Siri.
