Apple is in conversations with Google about employing the search giant’s generative artificial intelligence model called Gemini for its next iPhone, as the corporation races to embrace a technology that has upended the tech sector.
According to three sources with knowledge of the conversations, the talks are preliminary and the precise parameters of a possible deal have not yet been established. Apple has also held negotiations with other A.I. companies, one of these people said, as it aims to tap into the potential of a huge language model capable of processing vast quantities of data and generating text on its own.
Apple CEO Tim Cook has assured investors that the business will launch new generative A.I. features this year. Google and Samsung, the company’s rivals in the smartphone market, have already included Gemini in their most recent models to trim films and condense audio recordings.
Both Google and Apple choose not to comment. Bloomberg previously covered their discussions.
One of the oldest collaborations in technology would be extended if Apple and Google struck cooperation on generative AI. Google has been instrumental in the success of the iPhone ever since Apple unveiled the gadget in 2007. Initially, it offered Google Maps for navigation. Later, it negotiated a lucrative partnership whereby Google pays Apple more than $18 billion annually to become the default search engine for the iPhone’s Safari browser.
Google’s talks to bring generative AI capabilities to the iPhone would be the most recent instance of the company stepping in to close a gap in Apple’s offerings. According to two people familiar with its development, Apple has been lagging in its efforts to create its big language model, the technology underlying chatbots like ChatGPT and Gemini.
Apple has paid a price for holding off on delivering an AI product. This year, Microsoft overtook it as the most valuable public business in the world, breaking its ten-year reign. Microsoft has been actively pursuing artificial intelligence. The technology’s ability to upend industries and generate trillions of dollars in new revenue has been hailed.
Apple has the potential to be a major player in the A.I. space despite its delays. With over two billion devices in use, the firm is a desirable partner for Google and other companies. In the future, when artificial intelligence (AI) services are used to manage people’s calendars or health data, its reputation for safeguarding customers’ private information may prove advantageous.
An agreement might see the Gemini model available on iPhones all across the world, providing Google with access to a vast user base and further popularizing generative artificial intelligence. A deal with Apple is enticing as, almost suddenly, Google might surpass its main competitor, OpenAI, which creates ChatGPT, in the number of users utilizing its artificial intelligence.
After multiple failures in its AI goals, Apple’s decision to choose Google as a supplier would be a significant vote of confidence in the search engine giant. Bard, the company’s first artificial intelligence chatbot, had mixed reviews upon launch in March of last year and didn’t gain as much traction as ChatGPT.
Google unveiled Gemini, a brand-new chatbot, in February. Last month, users discovered that the chatbot’s image generator was producing racially inaccurate drawings of historical individuals and was frequently refusing to produce photos of white people, which prompted charges of bias. Google promised to address the issue and disabled the ability to take photos of people.
Analyst Toni Sacconaghi of Bernstein Research referred to the agreement between Apple and Google as a “win-win” in a note on Tuesday, citing the latter’s work on Gemini as validation and Apple receiving generative AI for iPhones. Additionally, he stated that Apple could benefit from artificial intelligence on iPhones without having to own an AI model; instead, it could accept a commission from Google, which charges $19.99 a month for its Gemini Advanced app.
Businesses haven’t yet profited from generative AI. Large language model operations on the cloud come at astronomical costs, and businesses and consumers are just now beginning to foot the bill for this cutting-edge technology. However, they believe that as artificial intelligence (AI) systems get more powerful and the cost of creating data centers decreases, profits will rise.
The recent agreement between Apple and Google may come under examination by US authorities. A case brought by the Justice Department against Google for violating competition law by paying Apple to be the iPhone’s default search engine and other services is nearing its conclusion. The non-jury trial is being presided over by Judge Amit P. Mehta of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, and a decision is anticipated this year.
