SmartPhone to SmartCompanion (iPhone to iPal)

"Humans are tool builders. We build tools that can dramatically amplify our innate human abilities" - Steve Jobs

Over the years we humans have built great tools to help us do various activities. Let’s for a moment look at some of the activities that anyone, say John, maybe doing right from waking up to sleeping and then waking up again. As our day begins, we wake up in the morning and confirm time, we are assisted by a clock which maybe a standalone one or on a phone. This may further be helping us with an alarm (and a snooze for that extra power nap!). This is nothing but a tool helping us getting sense of time. As we are getting ready, we put on some music on the phone to get excited for the day. We get ready and head out, take some mode of transportation to reach office. It could be bicycle, car, train, bus, cab or a combination of these. Imagine for moment the distance that we had to cover walking vs use of these modes. These modes are again tools that come to our help to move faster and with less effort and at times also give us additional free time. On the way we may be using our phones to call or chat with office colleagues, friends, family. We may be taking meetings over the audio or video. We could be catching up news while listening to music, listening to podcasts etc. This use of phone continues for the rest of the day. Phone has become a tool which not only helps to do lots of stuff and amplifies our abilities, but it has become sort of a point (say interface) of connectedness to the world. But has it fulfilled all that connectedness needs? It has come so far, where does it go from here?

The nature of interface between the tools and human plays a big role in quick adaptation and usage of it. It is the key driver of the underlying core functionalities of the tool. Imagine from fixed landline phone days with dial wheel to today's mobile smartphone which we can carry anywhere and just speak to dial up. It’s amazing. This phone does so many things for us today. But can we talk to phone like I talk to my buddy, teacher, financial advisor, doctor, gymnasium coach etc.? Let’s imagine how life would be for someone if these capabilities come in.

Imagine someone, say John, was leaving in morning for office and his wife tells him to pick up the cake from bakery in the evening for their daughter's birthday. In the evening John gets busy and heads back in hurry to home. As his wife opens the door she asks for the cake. He is speechless as he has forgotten. Imagine if John picks and drops his best buddy Amit while on way and coming back from office. He tells him on the way that he has to pick cake in the evening, and he should remind him in case he forgets. What are chances of forgetting? Yes, lesser. Also, Amit may advise him to pick up a gift and flowers as well. But majority may not have office travel buddy like Amit. There are so many things in our day-to-day life that we turn towards different people (doctors, financial advisors, gym instructors etc.) who help us make our life better. All these come with their own level of expertise and availability. So, it’s not just the tools, but the capabilities of these people that we need. But wait, can the phone play that role, an intelligent Pal (iPal).

Now imagine someone else, say Rob, who does not have a buddy like John has. But, on his iPhone he has iPal. In similar scenario as above, Rob tells iPal to remind him in evening on his way back to pick up cake. As the evening time starts, iPal speaks in his headphone that he has to pick up the cake and has to reach on time for the birthday party. It also tells him that he should probably pick up a gift and flowers. Rob asks, so, by what time to leave and they have small conversation about places to go and route to take and conclude the time to leave. iPal also looks at office schedule and helps plan it and raises any alerts and suggest ways to handle it. Rob is all set and as time to leave approaches, iPal beeps in his headphone and they are ready to leave. As they approach the iPal in car (Yes, iPal in car!) auto starts the car air conditioning and unlocks and opens door as he approaches. In the car (say autonomous) system, iPal already knows the route plan and greets Rob and say we are all set. It starts to play music which Rob usually listens and says let me know if you want to change. It then gets into conversation with Rob about how the day was and what all he plans to do in the evening. As Rob is done shopping and they are moving towards house, iPal reminds Rob that around her last birthday, he had made a financial investment for her and would he like to make another one this year. They have a conversation about it and finalize some options to close the next day. Also, iPal reminds that after each birthday Rob starts annual medical checkup for her daughter and should it start to look for appointments. ?Next day as Rob moves from bedroom to living room, iPal in the house cleaning robot greets and enquires about party and asks when it can start to deep clean the place. It asks if there are any special instructions for extra cleaning spots. Rob is worried about having moved some meetings last night, iPal gets into counselling mode and does the risk analysis for Rob and suggest that its all good. It also reminds of the coming up presentation and how to prepare for it and weekend hangouts with college batchmates. iPal reminds that they have to close of the shortlisted investments and doctor appointments. This cheers up Rob and he looks forward to the day. He feels so cool to have iPal.

This way the iPal is kind of buddy/pal/companion which pervades across phones, wearables, devices, robots etc. It is the next level of interface between the humans and machines. Also, this machine and it’s AI software has evolved into a more intelligent entity taking care of various needs of a human including emotional needs. ?There are so many possibilities to expand further.

Those of you remember watching the movie IronMan and Tony Stark, he had a iPal like companion called JARVIS. Tony controlled the complete iron suit with the help of this companion. We can relate to Siri doing some of the things that we expect from iPal kind of companion. But, there so much more to be done. That could be the next direction of evolution of Apple or any another company or startup to come up with. This could potentially be a trillion-dollar opportunity for Apple as it looks for new era of evolution beyond iPhone.

As I concluded writing this article, I was pleasantly surprised to see some of the demos from Apple WWDC 2024 indicating some movement in this direction called Apple Intelligence. Check it out at :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RXeOiIDNNek&ab_channel=Apple ; https://www.apple.com/in/newsroom/2024/06/introducing-apple-intelligence-for-iphone-ipad-and-mac/

Other ref links:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J.A.R.V.I.S .

https://www.apple.com/in/siri/

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