Suspense crime, Digital Desk : Apple has crafted its image around being a follower rather than a pioneer, which is the planned approach to features such as Apple Maps and Apple Pay, which were released after competing apps. One year after announcing “Apple Intelligence” and roaming “Apple ChatGPT,” the company seems absent from the AI discussion ‘Apple is where?’.”

The United States AI innovation race is led by players like OpenAI, Google, Meta, and Microsoft while Apple remains silent. The question on everyone’s mind ahead of WWDC 2025 is if they will manage to solve the “AI gap.”

Apple iPhone Users’ Most Anticipated AI Features

With Apple’s userbase of more than 1 billion iPhones, having a market advantage is the company’s number one strength, but the AI developments fall flat. Innovations like text editing features Genmoji alongside an enhanced Siri did not cut it.

Much to Apple’s disappointment, the anticipated upgrade to Siri with enhanced app integration was quite delayed and resulted in delays, frustration, and even lawsuits from customers.

AI Services Apple Does Not Offer

Apple’s competitors are quickly closing the gap. Google’s Gemini is now a fully-fledged assistant for Android mobile devices and boasts multimodal presentation capabilities. Meta now features AI-enabled Ray-Ban glasses and utter integration of Meta AI to WhatsApp and Instagram.

OpenAI, which partnered with Apple to build Siri, has also worked with Jony Ive, the Apple ex-designer, to develop new AI devices, which tells us innovation has pivoted beyond Cupertino at a staggering pace.

Strategic Gaps and Disparities in Investment

The gaps in Apple’s strategy surrounding generative AI tend to run deeper than just a lack of structure; they are monetary as well. This spending in 2022 capex was $9.5 billion, which is just 2.4% of the company’s revenue, and their infrastructure investment for AI is predicting over $300 billion by 2025. This is in contrast to Amazon, Meta, Microsoft, or Alphabet who intend to spend AI infrastructure projetcs.

One of Apple’s responses could be to purchase AI Startups. Reportedly, the company has attempted negotiations with AI startups such as Perplexity AI and Anthropic. Acquiring Anthropic would decisively improve Apple’s capabilities in training and servicing proprietary frontier AI models.

Apple Might Tailor Partnerships To Shape Its AI Strategy

Instead of building everything from scratch, Apple can work on enhancing its systems by using externally developed components. These components would be third party owned, like Google’s Gemini AI model. Doing so with the existing deal with Google Search would allow Apple to retain its competitive edge.

Such collaborations could provide groundbreaking features for iPhones starting iOS updates presented in WWDC.

The Importance of Apple Intelligence is Considerable, But has Little Relevance to iPhone Sales.

At present, Apple Intelligence does not seem to add much value to the iPhone’s appeal. Customers purchase iPhones due to the brand, its reliability, and the ecosystem, but not because of AI tools. That attitude is unlikely to change unless Apple implements substantial unique AI features.

Nonetheless, the company can capitalize on the narrative that its chip architecture is highly optimized for on-device AI due to its apple systems.

Long-Term AI Risks: Could Technological Advances Replace the iPhone?

Looking into the future, there are advancements proposed integrated AI technology that might make smartphones obsolete. During a trial, Apple executive Eddy Cue conceded that there is a possibility of AI one day fully concealing an iPhone. This sentiment is also echoed by former Apple designer Ive’s new AI project with OpenAI.

If the company does not make changes, they risk losing their primary position in personal computing devices. However, the company’s position does have a strong trump card due to its unmatched brand, user bass, and ecosystem.

Event Watches for WWDC 2025

As the date approaches for the WWDC keynote on June 9, Apple finds itself in a full tension situation. They can either continue their privacy-centric evolution to AI or take a completely different stroke and try something drastic such as a major acquisition, or complete redesign of the iPhone along with introducing a surprise feature.

Regardless of the route taken, the world is eyeing Apple closely to check if it will change its position in the AI-centric technology world.

Read More: Google Gemini Adds Scheduled Actions to Act More Like a Personal Assistant