Apple Acquires Artificial Intelligence Startup Perceptio

Apple confirmed today to Bloomberg that it has acquired deep learning company Perceptio, which uses artificial intelligence to classify photos on smartphones.

According to an October 2014 article on Re/code, Perceptio’s technology enables phones to do advanced calculations without storing user data in the cloud. Its founders, Nicolas Pinto and Zak Stone also created a photo sharing app called Smoothie.

Pinto’s Twitter bio says he is a research scientist and computer science lecturer at MIT and Harvard, while Stone holds a PhD in computer vision from Harvard.

Apple spokesman Colin Johnson told Bloomberg that “Apple buys smaller technology companies from time to time, and we generally do not discuss our purpose or plans.”