ICYMI: Apple’s AI Push to Hinge on Robots, Security, Lifelike Siri - podcast episode cover

ICYMI: Apple’s AI Push to Hinge on Robots, Security, Lifelike Siri

Aug 14, 20257 min
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Episode description

Apple Inc. is plotting its artificial intelligence comeback with an ambitious slate of new devices, including robots, a lifelike version of Siri, a smart speaker with a display and home-security cameras.
A tabletop robot that serves as a virtual companion, targeted for 2027, is the centerpiece of the AI strategy, according to people with knowledge of the matter. The smart speaker with a display, meanwhile, is slated to arrive next year, part of a push into entry-level smart-home products.
Mark Gurman, Managing Editor for Global Consumer Tech for Bloomberg News, explains why home security is seen as another big growth opportunity for the tech giant. Mark speaks with Tim Stenovec and Carol Massar on Bloomberg Businessweek Daily.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Transcript

Speaker 1

Bloomberg Audio Studios, Podcasts, radio News. You're listening to Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser and Tim Stenoveek on Bloomberg Radio.

Speaker 2

We want to get to Apple headline crossing just a moment ago, Apple plotting. It's AI come back, artificial intelligence with an ambitious late of new devices, including robots and a lifelike version of Siri. There's a lot more. Let's just get to the guy who knows this company and put out this story. Here's our own Mark German, and he's Bloomberg News Managing editor for Global Consumer Tech. He's

out there on the West coast. All right, walk us through your exclusive What did you learn about what AI? Apple is up to when it comes to AI?

Speaker 3

Mark, So, the conventional wisdom is that Apple is lagging right now. It has no future, The product pipeline is very limited. They're struggling in AI. The world is ending, and Tim Cook should be fired as CEO. I think I came on here a few weeks ago tell you that there's no way Tim Cook is going anywhere. And it is true that they are struggling terribly in AI. But at the end of the day, Apple is a hardware company, and they have been planning this big new

hardware pipeline. At the center of it is robotics, a push into smart home and home security, multiple new versions of Siri, and a slew of other devices from smart glasses to headsets to foldables. The centerpiece of the renewed AI hardware strategy is a tabletop robot that's coming in twenty twenty seven sometime around then. This is a device that would sit on your desk, sit in your kitchen,

sit in your living room. It would have an iPad like display with sensors and a robotic arm, and the arm would be able to push the display around the room to follow people, to look at you, to summon you or be summoned by you, help you get work done throughout the day. The idea is to bring artificial intelligence to life in a way that hardware companies have not done so before, blending the AI with hardware manipulation

and robotics. The companies also working on a home pod with a screen for next year.

Speaker 4

This is a variation of that robotic device.

Speaker 3

This would not have the robotic arm, but would have a similar display and functionality. There's also several new versions of Siri in the works. There's a redesigned Sery visually for the iPhone, the iPad of the Mac. There's new underpinnings to that Sery we've talked about that. Apple has signaled that this is a revamped to Sery coming in the spring. There's also a new visual version of SIY

for home devices. It uses something similar to Microsoft Clippy from twenty thirty years ago, remember that virtual assistant yep. And then you also, I know there's a lot. I have a push it to home security with a new home security camera system taps into a home door bell as well. This would compete with Ring and Nest and ADT and other companies, and also is the sensors at the center of a home automation strategy.

Speaker 1

So, Mark, you gave us a lot to think about. We have a couple of minutes left with you. We don't have a Crystal Ball, but we have Mark German, which is the next best thing. If there is sort of a single device in here that's iPhone like in the sense of it being the center of the universe for Apple, does one of them stick out to you as that I.

Speaker 3

Don't think the iPhone in the next five to ten years is going to go away as the center of the universe.

Speaker 4

What I do think is going to happen.

Speaker 3

Is the next generation of ecosystems. You know, instead of being built around the phone and the cloud, it's going to be built around AI.

Speaker 4

So all the devices right including.

Speaker 3

The phone, are going to get demoted a bit and AI is going to become the center of the universe.

Speaker 4

And so you're going to have your phone, your home.

Speaker 3

Devices, your earbuds, your glasses, your watch, your computer, et cetera, and those are all going to be built around AI as the center, moving away from the phone and the cloud as the center.

Speaker 2

So the prototypes all ready to go. H oh, they're getting up the assembly lines and they're going to hit the stores, right, they're all ready to go, or not yet.

Speaker 3

In terms of these devices, everything that I'm talking about today, those are mostly forward looking. We're talking about things coming out twenty six, twenty seven. There's a mention in the story of a robotic arm for retail stores and manufacturing that's probably five seven to seven years away, so we're talking twenty thirties.

Speaker 4

There. I mentioned the.

Speaker 3

Foldable iPad MAC device that's going to be at the end of this decade. The foldable iPhone is going to be at the end of next year. This year, in September, a little less than a month from now, Apple's going to introduce its first redesigned iPhone in several years. This is the iPhone seventeen line, also the slim down iPhone, new AirPods, and new Apple Watch Ultra with a slightly larger display and satellite connectivity for hikers. So in the

near term, some good stuff. In the long term, some much cooler stuff.

Speaker 1

You know, the hardware that you've highlighted is nothing without the software mark, and you've documented the struggles that Apple has had when it comes to its own work with AI software talking about potential acquisitions. Can Apple pull off this hardware with the way the software is now?

Speaker 4

Yes.

Speaker 3

So, as I mentioned in the story, they're looking at two directions for revamping the underpinnings of Siri.

Speaker 4

One is called Linwood and one is called Glenwood.

Speaker 3

Linwood is using upgraded versions of the company's own internal foundation models. That's the team that Meta has been poaching a bunch of people from, including the head of the team. We talked about this a few weeks ago. Glenwood is using a third party provider to rebuild Siri, so building Sirie around models from a third party, and obviously third parties like Anthropic, like open Aiye, like Google, they've proven

out their models, they work extraordinarily well. And so Apple's backup plan essentially is to go external so they're able to get their internal models up to snuff. And honestly that makes a lot of sense, all.

Speaker 2

Right, kind to leave it there, Mark, thank you so much, of course. Bloomer's Mark German joining us with the latest on his exclusive on Apple. Mark is Bloomberg News Managing editor for Global Consumer Tech. He's out there on the West Coast. Shares of Apple have been as high as two point three percent interday high rising on Mark's story. The stock still up, but now only again of about

one point four percent. But we have seen Apple shares popping since August fifth, so we have seen a move in a big way to the website for Apple over the last week or so. So interesting reporter. Check it out. It's on the Bloomberg and at Bloomberg dot com.

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