Apple is close to finalizing a deal with Google that would involve the iPhone maker paying the tech giant approximately one billion dollars per year. This agreement would grant Apple access to a custom version of Google’s Gemini AI model, which is intended to power a significant upgrade for the Siri voice assistant.
This potential partnership represents a major shift for Apple, a company known for relying on its own proprietary technology. The plan is to use Google’s model as a temporary solution until Apple’s own artificial intelligence becomes sufficiently advanced. This external AI will help power a range of new features planned for Siri.
The custom AI model from Google features 1.2 trillion parameters. Parameters are a key measure of an AI model’s complexity and capability. This figure far exceeds the scale of Apple’s current models. For comparison, the current cloud-based version of Apple Intelligence uses 150 billion parameters, making Google’s proposed model roughly eight times more complex.
Earlier this year, Apple also evaluated AI models from other companies, including OpenAI and Anthropic. After conducting tests with models from all three providers, Apple decided to move forward with Google.
According to the report, the overhauled Siri is expected to launch next spring. However, as the launch is still several months away, the specific plans for the revamp are subject to change.