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Bloomberg
Apple Inc., which is spending $850 million on a 130-megawatt solar farm near San Francisco over 25 years, can begin selling power into wholesale markets in the latest foray by a technology company into the energy business.
Apple’s subsidiary Apple Energy LLC may sell energy, capacity and other services needed to maintain reliable power, according to an order by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. In granting approval, the commission determined the company did not raise the risk of being able to unfairly hike up power prices. The iPhone maker is among a group of companies investing in energy projects in a bid to tackle global warming and cut electric bills. Google, Microsoft Corp. and Amazon.com Inc. are backing wind turbines and solar farms to power their operations and lower their carbon footprint.
“When you own power production facilities then you would typically want to have authority to sell power,†Kit Konolige, an analyst with Bloomberg Intelligence, said by phone Thursday. “It is indicative of a number of related trends that are lowering demand for power produced by utilities.â€
Apple entered into an agreement last year with First Solar Inc. to buy power from the California solar farm in what was at the time the largest-ever solar procurement for a company that isn’t a utility, according to data compiled by Bloomberg New Energy Finance. Apple also owns 20 megawatts of generation in the Nevada Power Company service area and 50 megawatts in the Salt River Project service area in Arizona, according to the FERC order. All of Apple’s data centers are now powered by renewables.
A spokesman for Apple declined to comment. Shares rose 0.6 percent to $105.86 at 2:07 p.m. in New York. Google, the biggest corporate buyer of clean energy in the U.S., announced in June it agreed to purchase energy from wind farms under development in Norway and Sweden to power its data centers in Europe.
The company has a goal of running all operations on clean energy. Apple may begin wholesale power sales Saturday. Google gained similar rights in 2010.
APPLE TO BUY AI STARTUP TURI FOR ABOUT $200MN
Apple Inc. acquired artificial intelligence startup Turi Inc. for about $200 million, according to people familiar with the situation, in the latest deal by the iPhone maker to accumulate advanced computing capabilities for its products and services.
Turi helps developers create and manage software and services that use a form of AI called machine learning. It also has systems that let companies to build recommendation engines, detect fraud, analyze customer usage patterns and better target potential users, according to the Seattle-based startup’s website. Apple could use this to more rapidly integrate the technology with future products.
Apple’s move Friday is part of a broader battle among Google, Facebook Inc. and Amazon.com Inc. to gain an edge in AI, particularly in the field known as pervasive computing, where software tries to automatically infer what people want, one of the people said. Turi’s technology could feed into Apple’s Siri digital assistant, the person added, and help define new ways computers interact with people.
“Apple buys smaller technology companies from time to time, and we generally do not discuss our purpose or plans,†Apple said in a statement. GeekWire earlier reported the acquisition.
Apple sees its Turi acquisition as a way to better tap into the growing community of AI researchers, said a person familiar with the deal. Apple has been criticized by researchers for being too secretive about its AI work. In contrast, Turi held a two-day machine-learning conference in July in San Francisco for data scientists and academics.
Formerly known as Dato, Turi raised more than $25 million from venture capital investors including New Enterprise Associates and Madrona Venture Group, according to CrunchBase.
Turi couldn’t be reached for comment on the deal. The Turi team will remain in Seattle, one of the people familiar with the situation said. Apple has purchased multiple firms over the past couple of years that specialize in artificial intelligence.
The company has also begun to integrate these technologies into products such as its iPhone software and Siri. In January, Apple acquired Emotient, a startup that uses AI to recognize and act upon facial expressions. Last year, Apple acquired a pair of voice-centric AI startups, VocalIQ and Perceptio, to bolster Siri.