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Gurman: Apple Believes Its AI Technology Is Two Years Behind Rivals

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Some Apple employees believe that the company's in-house generative AI technology powering Apple Intelligence is more than two years behind industry leaders, according to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman.

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Writing in his latest Power On newsletter, Gurman's sources within Apple tell him that the company's own studies suggest its upcoming AI features lack the "wow factor" of rival technologies currently offered by the likes of Google, OpenAI, and Meta.

For example, internal studies at Apple reportedly show that OpenAI's ChatGPT is 25% more accurate than the new Siri and can answer 30% more questions. Of course, Apple has already conceded as much, given that part of its strategy includes a partnership with OpenAI to integrate ChatGPT into its operating systems, providing users with the option to tap into greater generative AI assistance if they want it.

Despite the setback, Gurman notes that Apple is in the unique position of presiding over a vast ecosystem of tightly integrated devices, which gives it the advantage of being able to quickly deploy new technologies across its product line. This could prove advantageous as the company works to close the AI gap with competitors, and its history of successfully entering new markets suggests it shouldn't be counted out.

Apple's latest iPhone 16 series supports Apple Intelligence, as does its Macs and its iPad lineup (with the exception of the entry-level model) following last week's iPad mini 7 announcement. The first set of AI features are expected to roll out to these devices next week.

Meanwhile, a new iPhone SE 4 with Apple Intelligence support is set to launch in March, with an AI-capable entry-level iPad said to be coming later in the same year. In addition, Apple is working on bringing the technology to Vision Pro, and given that AI notification summaries can be delivered to Apple Watch, Gurman suggests that by early 2026, "nearly every Apple device with a screen" will run Apple Intelligence.

Article Link: Gurman: Apple Believes Its AI Technology Is Two Years Behind Rivals
 
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https://www.macrumors.com/2024/10/21/apple-artificial-intelligence-years-behind-rivals/
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Is anyone else barely using AI tools because you're just so used to doing things the "old way"? For me, certain workflows have become such a habit that it's tough to change them now.

The main thing I use is rephrasing emails to C-Level folks with ChatGPT, but beyond that, I don’t really feel the need for it in my day-to-day. To me, using AI feels a bit like giving instructions to an agency—you spend so much time explaining what you want that it almost feels faster to just do it yourself! Maybe I'm just getting old, haha.

The Apple Intelligence features also seem almost hidden? I always forget it is even there or an option.

On a side note, I do think the new Siri "glow" effect looks cool
 
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The whole world knows this.

Apple got caught in a panic when ChatGPT emerged out of nowhere, they probably knew rivals Samsung and Google were working on AI but I can guarantee Apple brushed it off until they were caught by the ChatGPT earthquake.

To be fair, it wasn't an expected earthquake, as evidenced by the sharp share price rises of AI-linked tech companies not long after.

But nevertheless it was an earthquake and Apple had done nothing, I repeat nothing, to reinforce the foundations, aka invest in AI. This is even more outrageous when you factor in how long they've had Siri baked into their products (Samsung killed off Bixby, etc). Siri has barely changed since it was introduced in 2011. Yes. 2011.

Now they are playing a desperate catch up and rushing something, anything, out without little care or thought. It is wholly embarrassing to release a suite of products with a cornerstone product Apple 'Intelligence' that isn't even available. Embarrassing.

Tim Cook has overstayed his welcome and needs to move on, time is proving a lot of (not all, but a lot of) his judgement calls have been wrong.
 
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In some ways though they are ahead. In terms of using a mini LLM on device - though I believe Google does this on the Pixel too? (correct me if i'm wrong).

I know they had a breakthrough in usuage in that area though. I don't think it should be Apple's job to build yet another massive LLM like ChatGPT - we have enough of them, all doing largely similar things and taking up lots and lots of energy to do it.

I terms of LLM I think it makes sense to use on board for all language processing, Siri controlling the device, Siri working with requests etc. Then use a 3rd party massive LLM for more complex questions, let the user choose between ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini and who else might be the best at the time. I don't see why Apple has to build another one of those and compete in the top % - it'd be better if they focussed on another part of AI that improves the LLMs already available, like an advanced reasoning algo.

I think they'll most struggling in the generative image AI, which to be fair is some of the most fun but also most pointless parts of generative AI. There's no real serious use for it to be honest, but I do think their way of letting you create custom emojis is a great idea.
 
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The main advantage of Apple Intelligence is that it asynchronously derives context from on-device data and can pass that context to its own (or other) AI services at the prompt level. Overall, Apple has a great edge strategy and probably the most neural compute in the world (distributed). Just needs some more time and hopefully the dismissal of the cringy “AI for the rest of us” tagline.
 
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Could leverage the entire iPhone 16 userbase for AI training when charging during user specified times and reward users who participate

+ free replacement battery after x months of participation if falling under the 80% threshold
 
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ifxf said:
Other then generating fake homework papers, what can AI do?
Click to expand...
One of the big promises of AI is that it can remove the technical element for certain operations and allow for plain language inputs to tell the computer what you want it to do. For example, instead of writing out complex formulas to manipulate data in Excel you could just tell Excel what you want it to do. We’re already seeing this with generative remove tools in photo editing apps whereas it used to require considerable work in Photoshop to remove certain objects.
 
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Even so, "answering questions" is best left to Google or OpenAI. The real power of AI comes from specialization - and that is the one thing Apple has that OpenAI doesn't. I have to tell ChatGPT everything about my situation, specifically for it to come up with "ideas". With Apple Intelligence, the device knows my calendar/reminders/notes/emails/messages and can provide the context so you can just ask things related to what you are currently doing, vs fully explaining what you are currently doing.

That's not to say general LLMs aren't useful - I'm using them all the time for software development - they are perfect as a digital "rubber duck" - something you explain your bug or issue to out loud, and usually by explaining it to a third party you find the problem in your logic. But with LLM's for those cases where you don't work out the problem while explaining it, you actually get a decent response that is often better than manually filtering google for the top stack overflow answers.
 
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Not surprised. The tech world moves fast and Apple is notoriously “late to the game” so they can refine. But with ML (it’s not AI… it’s machine learning), there is no later to the game.

But I would argue they don’t need to catch up. They need to do it right. And Siri is 8 years behind everyone else so I’d rather they focus on making her better than this dumb generative stuff.
 
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ifxf said:
Other then generating fake homework papers, what can AI do?
Click to expand...

you really don't know???

I mean, AI might not be useful for your work or the way you think, but to suggest that's all it's good for is either terribly misinformed or you're just trolling people here.

I haven't used AI much, but a few weeks ago, I had to create a power of attorney letter in German (I speak it but not perfectly and I don't know German law). AI helped me do in 10 mins what would probably taken about 2 hours and I got a great letter that a German lawyer friend of mine proofread and said was excellent.

So yes, there are MANY use cases for AI. Experiment, play, and have fun :)
 
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