Apple is unquestionably late to the AI party. While Microsoft and Google have rolled out and integrated proprietary generative AI tech into their massive platforms, Apple has remained quiet on the trend—and the silence is surprising, considering the heat AI has generated, and the fact that Apple is one of the world’s most valuable tech companies. Hell, even Meta is all-in on adding intrusive AI features to its products.
But if rumor and speculation are to be believed, Apple is ready to make some noise. The company is widely expected to roll out major AI features as part of its new suite of software updates this year, including iOS 18. We don’t even need to turn to the rumor mill or trust unsubstantiated claims to infer this: Apple researchers have already publicized much of their progress on AI, such as work on the company’s proprietary AI model, an AI image editor, and an AI image animator.
Even with all this work done in-house, Apple might not have the resources to pull of all its upcoming AI features together without an assist. According to Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman, the company is currently in talks to outsource some of its AI processing needs to OpenAI and its generative AI technology. If a deal were to go through, Apple could use OpenAI’s GPT models to run a chatbot, like ChatGPT, in iOS, among other new features.
This isn’t the first time the company has approached OpenAI about such a deal, nor is it the first time Apple has looked to a third-party for AI processing. We know, for example, the company is in discussions with Google to license Gemini for some of its AI ventures. It seems Apple is still exploring its options for who to partner with, and could even go with another party altogether.
You would think the company would be a bit more concerned about the timing of these deals, however: WWDC is just over two months away, and that’s when all eyes will be on Apple to see what the company has been cooking in the AI department. ChatGPT launched at the end of 2022, kicking off this AI frenzy; Apple will be joining the party a year and a half late, and the tech world will be taking note of how much (or how little) the company is doing to embrace AI in the near-term.
It’s possible that Apple is hedging its bets until then, seeing how much they can handle on their own before dedicating itself to outsourcing AI process. If the company can power an AI-upgraded Siri on its own, on-device, that would be much better for them than relying on Google or OpenAI’s tech. Anything outsourced to other companies will likely need to be handled in the cloud, which decreases their security. On-device AI would keep your information restricted to your iPhone, while cloud-based AI could leave your data exposed to the eyes of Google, OpenAI, or whoever else Apple may partner with.
