Most specialists agree that Apple faces an uphill battle to compete within the AI race. The corporate’s Apple Intelligence platform arrived late, and felt distinctly underbaked even then; Siri is a punchline and enhancements to it hold being pushed again; and rivals are pushing ahead with ever extra spectacular options.
Apple would like to discover a shortcut to success, and it might have discovered one. Sources report that the corporate is giving severe consideration to bidding for the startup Perplexity AI, which might permit it to transplant a piece of experience and ready-made expertise into Apple Park and leapfrog most of the obstacles it presently faces.
Perplexity runs an AI-powered search engine which might already carry out the contextual tips which Apple marketed forward of the iPhone 16 launch however hasn’t but managed to construct into Siri. For instance, I ran the next three queries consecutively:
- Which Warhammer 40k faction is most enjoyable to play?
- What about portray?
- How do you outline superior?
For the second question, the search engine knew I used to be asking which Warhammer faction is finest for portray, and for the third question, it knew I meant superior portray and was referring to a phrase in its earlier reply. These are easy logical steps, however Siri can’t do that with out resorting to ChatGPT. Apple would far want to have its personal tech for such features, and thus be capable to management the person expertise completely.
Cupertino executives are understood to have held inner discussions concerning the thought of shopping for Perplexity; Bloomberg reporter Mark Gurman particularly claims that M&A chief Adrian Perica has spoken concerning the matter with Eddy Cue and senior members of Apple’s AI workforce, though he notes that “discussions are at an early stage and will not result in a proposal.” Apple additionally hasn’t but spoken to anybody at Perplexity, which has issued an announcement denying all data.
Within the newest version of his Energy On publication, Gurman analyses the potential deal in larger element. He notes that it could dwarf any earlier Apple acquisition: its largest up to now was Beats for $3 billion in 2014, whereas Perplexity was just lately valued at $14 billion.
Traditionally, Apple has been cautious of enormous acquisitions, whereas rivals, akin to Fb (shopping for WhatsApp for $22 billion) and Google (buying cloud safety platform Wiz for $32 billion), have spent massive to scoop up corporations. It may very well be a mark of how apprehensive Apple is concerning the AI state of affairs that it’s contemplating such a serious and out-of-character transfer. However after a 12 months of complications and obstacles, it additionally might repay in an enormous means.
