Apple has tossed one other crumb to traders questioning when the world will get to see some ‘Made in Cupertino’ GenAI: Count on Apple to disclose what it’s been engaged on on this buzzy slice of synthetic intelligence “later this year”, per CEO Tim Cook dinner.
Throughout an earnings name yesterday, Apple’s chief exec emphasised its ongoing funding in AI, alongside different — as he put it — “groundbreaking innovation”, such because the applied sciences which underpin Apple’s Vision Pro VR/AR headset, saying: “We continue to spend a tremendous amount of time and effort and we’re excited to share the details of our ongoing work in that space later this year.”
There was no extra steer on when precisely Cupertino will pull again the curtain on its AI efforts. However its annual developer confab, WWDC, sometimes takes place in June — and will definitely be one date to observe for any large reveals right here.
Analysts tuned into the decision had been interested by “potential upcoming announcements on AI”, and through the Q&A piece of the Q1 2024 outcomes name, Cook dinner tickled the hearth of anticipation a little bit extra, segueing from enthusing about “enterprise opportunities” for Imaginative and prescient Professional to referencing generative AI straight.
“In terms of generative AI, which I would guess is your focus, we have a lot of work going on internally, as I’ve alluded to before,” he stated. “Our M.O., if you will, has always been to do work and then talk about work and not to get out in front of ourselves. And so we’re going to hold that to this as well. But we’ve got some things that we’re incredibly excited about, that we’ll be talking about later this year. ”
Apple’s senior management crew was additionally requested in regards to the stage of investments it’s making in AI, given the size of a few of the bets being made by different tech companies.
Chief monetary officer Luca Maestri responded briefly and bullishly — however with out placing any figures on the extent of spend — to that one. “We’ve always said we will never under invest in the business. So we are making all the investments that are necessary throughout our product development, software development services development,” he stated. “So we will continue to invest in every area of the business — and at the appropriate level — and we’re very excited about what’s in store for us for the rest of the year.”
The iPhone maker additionally fielded a query about edge processing and AI through the name, with one other analyst asking if it’s “a believer in the edge thesis that AI and processing on smartphones and devices like yours is going to have a huge role in AI and AI apps and that it’s something you guys can take advantage of”.
Cook dinner wasn’t going to be drawn into tossing something bigger than crumbs (to proceed the metaphor) — however he supplied, maybe, the equal of a wink towards the substance of the question, affirming: “Let me just say that I think there’s a huge opportunity for apple with Gen AI and and AI — without getting into more details and getting out in front of myself.”
Apple’s long-standing positioning of itself as pro-privacy and pro-user presents each a problem and a chance relating to generative AI which calls for huge quantities of (usually private) information to coach AI fashions within the searched for drive for utility.
Nonetheless if Apple can provide customers GenAI instruments that don’t demand customers’ information is uploaded to a 3rd occasion cloud someplace, with all of the privateness and safety dangers that may entail, and as an alternative processing to energy the tech will be executed domestically, on machine, it may — doubtlessly — carve itself (and its ecosystem) a differentiating area of interest vs the present data-gobbling market leaders in GenAI. (OpenAI, as an example, is now facing a charge its AI chatbot, ChatGPT, breaches Europe’s data protection laws in areas equivalent to AI mannequin coaching.)
In terms of edge AI, efficiency will after all be key. However that is Apple — and finessing merchandise, through its personal {hardware} and software program improvement, is its enterprise — so if anybody has each the rational and assets to drag off improvement of privacy-conscious GenAI it’s going to be Apple.
