EP 558: Apple cooked on AI? Apple's Siri failure and the end of its AI innovation
🎯 Summary
Podcast Episode Summary: EP 558: Apple cooked on AI? Apple’s Siri failure and the end of its AI innovation
This episode of the Everyday AI Show focuses on the significant strategic pivot Apple is reportedly making in its generative AI efforts, analyzing the implications of potentially outsourcing core AI capabilities for Siri to competitors like OpenAI or Anthropic. The host argues this signals the “beginning of the end” for Apple’s status as a leading AI innovator.
1. Focus Area: The primary focus is Apple’s Generative AI Strategy Failure, specifically concerning the development of a “smarter Siri.” Secondary topics include the contrast between Apple’s secretive, perfectionist approach versus the iterative development required for modern LLMs, competitive analysis against Google and Meta, and the potential obsolescence of Apple’s long-standing vertical integration model.
2. Key Technical Insights:
- Internal Model Underperformance: Apple’s internally developed large language models (LLMs) reportedly performed 20% worse than aging competitor technology, forcing the strategic pivot.
- Privacy vs. Partnership Demands: Apple is reportedly demanding that external models (from Anthropic/OpenAI) run on Apple’s private infrastructure to maintain its privacy narrative, a technical hurdle that may be contributing to negotiation delays.
- Edge AI vs. Cloud Dependency: The situation highlights the tension between Apple’s desire for powerful on-device (edge) AI capabilities and the current necessity of relying on massive, external cloud-based LLMs for advanced reasoning.
3. Business/Investment Angle:
- Strategic Failure & Market Reaction: The failure to deliver promised AI features (like the “smarter Siri”) is leading to ridicule, potential class-action lawsuits for false advertising, and is expected to negatively impact Apple’s stock performance.
- Cost of External Dependency: Outsourcing a core intelligence technology represents an unprecedented financial burden, with Anthropic reportedly demanding a multi-billion dollar annual investment that escalates yearly.
- Innovation Lag: Apple’s market capitalization growth has significantly lagged behind competitors like Microsoft and Alphabet, which the host attributes directly to their aggressive investment and output in the generative AI space.
4. Notable Companies/People:
- Apple (Tim Cook, John Giannandrea): Criticized for marketing “Apple Intelligence” without substance, leading to broken promises and the removal of the AI chief.
- Bloomberg (Mark Gurman): The source of the critical report detailing Apple’s outreach to competitors.
- Anthropic & OpenAI: The primary external candidates being courted to power Siri, with Anthropic currently emerging as a leading (though expensive) option.
- Google & Meta: Cited as aggressive competitors successfully investing heavily in AI talent (Meta’s new Super Intelligence Lab) and integrating capable edge AI (Google’s Gemma models on Android).
5. Future Implications: The conversation suggests that Apple’s reliance on external providers for core intelligence marks a fundamental break from its vertical integration strategy, creating a long-term dependency that could cement its slide as an innovation leader. If Apple cannot quickly secure a deal or rapidly improve internally, it risks falling further behind in the AI arms race, which the host views as the defining technological battleground for future global power.
6. Target Audience: This episode is most valuable for Technology Professionals, AI/ML Practitioners, and Business Strategists/Investors who need rapid analysis on major shifts in Big Tech strategy and the competitive landscape of generative AI development.
🏢 Companies Mentioned
💬 Key Insights
"Alphabet/Google with the Gemini 2.5 Pro is the best model in the world, at least right now, and it's not necessarily close."
"When you look at the other most valuable companies in the world today, Nvidia, Microsoft, Apple number three, four, Amazon, five, Google, and six, Meta. Guess what? The other five companies aside from Apple have created measurable, invaluable generative AI output in-house, right?"
"This is the first time that Apple has gone through a major outsourcing of a core intelligence technology in the company's history."
"That Apple perfectionism prevents the iterative improvement approach that AI models require, right? AI models are not perfect. They need to be constantly updated and improved. That is not in Apple's DNA."
"Building the most important aspect of your company in-house, and you're having to pay your competitors to do it for you. That is a sure signal of a company that is going to slide for years to come unless they do something drastic."
"If the future of innovation is AI... This does not bode well for Apple's future if you cannot [innovate in AI]."