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Apple in Talks With Google to Bring Gemini AI Features to iPhone
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Apple is in discussions with Google to integrate its Gemini AI engine into the iPhone as part of iOS 18, according to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman.
![google-gemini.jpg]()
In a report citing people familiar with the situation, Gurman claims the two companies are in "active negotiations" to let Apple license Google's generative large-language models in order to power some new features coming in iOS 18.
"The two parties haven't decided the terms or branding of an AI agreement or finalized how it would be implemented," according to the report's sources.
With the release of iOS 18 later this year, Apple is rumored to be bringing major new AI capabilities to its iPhone operating system. According to Gurman, however, Apple is focusing on features that operate on-device and do not require an internet connection.
To power additional cloud-based generative AI features, such as the ability to create images and write essays based on single prompts, Apple is seeking a partner that has the necessary large-scale hardware infrastructure and compute capabilities already in place.
According to previous reporting by Gurman, Apple has been internally testing an "Apple GPT" rival that could compete with OpenAI's ChatGPT. The company has also been designing an "Ajax" framework for large language models, and is said to be spending millions of dollars a day on conversational AI research as training language models requires a lot of hardware.
However, the technology is still not as advanced as tools from Google and other rivals, making a partnership look like the better option, according to the latest report.
If the negotiations come to nothing, Apple could seek another generative AI provider such as OpenAI or turn to multiple partners. But if the talks bring about a deal, it could make up for any losses that result from the regulatory pressure facing the two companies' existing search partnership.
Google has paid Apple billions of dollars for several years to keep its search engine the default option in Safari browser on Apple devices. However, the existing deal is facing regulatory scrutiny from the U.S. Department of Justice and the European Commission over concerns that it helps Google maintain a search monopoly.
Both The Information and analyst Jeff Pu claim that Apple will have some kind of generative AI feature available on the iPhone and iPad around late 2024, which is when iOS 18 will be coming out. However, Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo said in August that there is "no sign" of generative AI technology coming in 2024, and he claimed that Apple's work on generative AI is "significantly behind its competitors."
Article Link: Apple in Talks With Google to Bring Gemini AI Features to iPhone
Why? They can just make a licensing agreement or buy another company.
And how is that an improvement? Swerving to avoid Google and running into Samsung, instead.
I don't know how you could come to that conclusion as Google is stumbling every step of the way as they try to keep up with OpenAI. They botched things up with Bard as they manually corrected bad responses, coupled with the overtuned diversity of Gemini, with the outputs still being questionable. Meanwhile, OpenAI just dropped a hint of what SORA could do, showing just how far behind Google really is.
It reminds me of how companies like Western Digital and Seagate had their thumb on the hard disk industry, until SSDs became prevalent. Now I won't buy anything that isn't Samsung when it comes to storage.
I say this with hope that Google can catch up, but seeing the way things are going with Gemini, I won't hold my breath.
this is likely a transition like when the iPhone came out and Apple was using Google Maps. Eventually, they developed their own maps app and replaced the Google one. Hopefully that final step is a smoother jump than it was for maps.
Cannot believe this is even being considered. What happened to what happens in your phone stays in your phone? This will undermine the entire stance on privacy built throughout the years. Might as well buy a Samsung phone which made the exact same deal.![]()
Apple is in discussions with Google to integrate its Gemini AI engine into the iPhone as part of iOS 18, according to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman.
![google-gemini.jpg]()
In a report citing people familiar with the situation, Gurman claims the two companies are in "active negotiations" to let Apple license Google's generative large-language models in order to power some new features coming in iOS 18.
"The two parties haven't decided the terms or branding of an AI agreement or finalized how it would be implemented," according to the report's sources.
With the release of iOS 18 later this year, Apple is rumored to be bringing major new AI capabilities to its iPhone operating system. According to Gurman, however, Apple is focusing on features that operate on-device and do not require an internet connection.
To power additional cloud-based generative AI features, such as the ability to create images and write essays based on single prompts, Apple is seeking a partner that has the necessary large-scale hardware infrastructure and compute capabilities already in place.
According to previous reporting by Gurman, Apple has been internally testing an "Apple GPT" rival that could compete with OpenAI's ChatGPT. The company has also been designing an "Ajax" framework for large language models, and is said to be spending millions of dollars a day on conversational AI research as training language models requires a lot of hardware.
However, the technology is still not as advanced as tools from Google and other rivals, making a partnership look like the better option, according to the latest report.
If the negotiations come to nothing, Apple could seek another generative AI provider such as OpenAI or turn to multiple partners. But if the talks bring about a deal, it could make up for any losses that result from the regulatory pressure facing the two companies' existing search partnership.
Google has paid Apple billions of dollars for several years to keep its search engine the default option in Safari browser on Apple devices. However, the existing deal is facing regulatory scrutiny from the U.S. Department of Justice and the European Commission over concerns that it helps Google maintain a search monopoly.
Both The Information and analyst Jeff Pu claim that Apple will have some kind of generative AI feature available on the iPhone and iPad around late 2024, which is when iOS 18 will be coming out. However, Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo said in August that there is "no sign" of generative AI technology coming in 2024, and he claimed that Apple's work on generative AI is "significantly behind its competitors."
Article Link: Apple in Talks With Google to Bring Gemini AI Features to iPhone
Gemini being categorized as reasonable and helpful has to be the silliest assessment I've heard in relation to AI...
I guess so, though the brand name Google Maps and YouTube helped sell iPhones whereas Gemini in my mind at least does not have the same appeal. That and selling iPhones isn’t as much of an issue these days. Or are they really fearing a smarter Android will lure people away from their ecosystem?
I'm literally on an iPhone to avoid that google machine as much as possible. If I wanted android tech, I'd buy that.
Apple needs to get it together.
Apple needs to get it together.
So they are essentially just building a wrapper around OpenAI / Gemini API. Extremely embarrassing for Apple, their AI and Siri team. Wasn’t Eddy Cue running these teams for the past decade?
No way, Apple. I just severed all ties with Google, except YouTube, including apps that use Google Adsense. I don't even use Siri for search as you can't change out Google. I don't care much for AI, but this could push me to leave Apple, whom I support with almost all my products/software.
How about I don't want any of my data to go to google?
Apple has been applying ML and transformer models for years for various features but they haven’t shipped anything relating to generative AI.
The thing is: Apple has had their AI product in the marketplace for 12+ years.
They've presented the promise of AI that'll understand your voice and language in 2011.
If the current state of their AI product isn't an indication of how far they've fallen behind - what is?
NFC payments are relatively simple technology and can be implemented inexpensively.
Whereas they've failed at making niche technology (Siri) mainstream for over a decade.
How?
When you search for something in Safari, Google can serve you ads on their results page.
Do you really believe that iOS 18' new AI features are just going to take serve you Google ad as a result? 🤣
As long as it is less annoying than Copilot is in Edge, Bing, or on Windows I do not care. I do not need some AI tool constantly reminding me that it is there like what Microsoft is doing.
Certainly seems like Tim and company fell behind in AI work … if this ends up being like an Apple Maps fiasco, the call for leadership change will be loud.
Bleep I hope not.
It's both really bad optics for apple (and reflects again just how bad they blew ai), and the privacy issues abound. If it's completely self contained, maybe. But if it talks to any of googles servers, that's a hard no.
It's both really bad optics for apple (and reflects again just how bad they blew ai), and the privacy issues abound. If it's completely self contained, maybe. But if it talks to any of googles servers, that's a hard no.
Hard no. Behaviour-vacuum Google does not get access to any of our devices. Google is the reason I block ads and all Google trackers.
I have never understood why people are so pissed off by Tim cook. He's doing his job, which is to run the company for the benefit of the shareholders, which coincidentally includes himself. That's why he'll never get booted. The board is happy, and it helps that he is on the board.
The sad thing is, Apple was totally ahead of its time back when it introduced Siri. However, they made nothing of it and seemed to make Siri worse with each update. It still doesn't comprehend most prompts and defaults to looking everything up on the Internet. Apart from setting alarms, timers and calling someone, Siri is mostly unusable for me, when instead it should be doing anything and everything. Apple missed big time.
I literally provided 2 examples of shipping features utilizing generative AI in current release versions of iOS and visionOS, the personal voice accessibility feature and the Vision Pro persona generation. There are other example, like the transformer model utilized in the keyboard autocorrect.