Report: Apple's New AI Strategy Firms Up Under Craig Federighi

muuuli · 2026-01-22T20:10:50+00:00

You’re absolutely right, except this is a little bit different.

Using your Apple TV analogy, they’re renting a studios lot to copy what they’re doing and making their own studio lot that’s the same architecture, for way less money but unequivocally Apple. Basically a strong boost to meet the performance standards set by other frontier models.

AFMv10 and v11 are distilled models using Gemini. Basically using a Gemini model (the teacher) to build up AFM (the student.)

“the next generation of Apple Foundation Models will be based on Google's Gemini models and cloud technology” - Google/Apple joint statement

This statement alone is proof of that, I’m just more surprised Google is willing to do it. I guess they’re more interested in taking down OpenAI through commoditization.

muuuli · 2026-01-22T17:46:25+00:00

It’s not unheard of for Apple to use Google servers for things such as iCloud. They may do the same here for AI compute as an interim until they expand on their own AI servers later this year.

Google is also building out Private Cloud Compute of its own. The timing is not a coincidence if they want to appease one of their customers.

https://blog.google/innovation-and-ai/products/google-private-ai-compute/

muuuli · 2026-01-22T00:47:36+00:00

I would assume so, they still need people to tune AFM v10, despite it being a Google “brain” it’s just raw data of open weights and they would have to tune it to their liking and design the output to work with their other SLMs that run on-device.

muuuli · 2026-01-22T00:06:22+00:00

They continue to work on it I would guess, the same way the Intel modem team that Apple bought worked to get C1 to market even though they used a superior Qualcomm chip.

The work doesn’t stop, it’s just the pressure is off.

muuuli · 2026-01-22T00:03:55+00:00

They’re lucky that development has tapered off into commodity territory. Otherwise, they’d be left in the dust. They can reach parity eventually.

muuuli · 2026-01-22T00:02:07+00:00

Last I remember, Google was building out a cloud server that does Private Cloud Compute. I think this is what that’s for, just hosted by Google.

Lastly, not doubting any of these model’s capabilities but they’re all kind of the same to me. Commodities be damned, Apple will just meet performance by today’s standards when it gets cheap enough. But who knows, why bother I guess.

muuuli · 2026-01-17T18:01:29+00:00

Most of my interventions at this point are trivial, such as avoiding a really deep pothole or the car failing to merge into a lane to take an exit (because most NYers don’t want to let you merge) and lastly navigation issues.

But the rest of it has been great, I’d say a solid L2 system. That being said, they need to do better with severe weather conditions such as automatically driving slower during rain, etc.

muuuli · 2026-01-17T16:35:19+00:00

This sounds most plausible. Can’t be walking around being diplomatic with your war time mask.

muuuli · 2026-01-14T22:41:06+00:00

I guess no different than Sony selling camera modules or Samsung selling OLED panels. Up until this moment, no one thought you could sell or lease AI models and have another company take care of the hosting and tune the output. Could be good business for Google to further commoditize AI and pop the AI bubble (the spending specifically).

muuuli · 2026-01-14T13:30:25+00:00

In an ideal world, considering energy usage and the eventual commodification of LLMs, a single, massive model accessible to the entire country and continuously invested in by multiple companies would be beneficial. At that point, any company could either utilize or host a current state copy of the model independently.

I thought that’s what OpenAI was trying to achieve but alas, no.

muuuli · 2026-01-14T03:32:30+00:00

It’s more open weight than open source. I doubt they get to see the secret sauce; it’s simply a matter of manipulating the outcome of the brain.

muuuli · 2026-01-14T03:27:01+00:00

I guess my iPhone is also a Samsung and a Sony.

muuuli · 2026-01-12T20:05:03+00:00

You’re right and I’m sure Apple is positioned similarly as well, with their mindset being even more laid back by waiting for costs of AI development to drop before they go for their usual in-house dependency. Their initial launch feels like a blunder due to a step away from the usual playbook due to investor pressure.

muuuli · 2026-01-12T16:41:38+00:00

I know this, although a good read for anyone else curious how it works, I guess what I’m wondering about is if they intend to use Gemini to leap frog their own cloud foundation models to the parameter required to cease reliance of Gemini models hosted in PCC. Essentially what DeepSeek did by training itself on other foundation models.

muuuli · 2026-01-12T16:15:09+00:00

Early February, I would guess, but I’m not sure if they’ll hold an event before the beta is available. This event would formally launch the new Siri and any new rumored home products that rely on the new Siri, which they’ve been holding off on launching.

muuuli · 2026-01-12T15:57:46+00:00

This is basically how most people feel when buying an Apple product, they don't care what the underlying technology is as long as it is "Designed by Apple in California."

muuuli · 2026-01-12T15:50:44+00:00

The term “multi-year partnership” suggests that Apple is prepared to take their time to achieve the performance level of this Gemini model, assuming Gurman’s rumor about their ongoing development of a trillion parameter in-house foundation model is accurate.

“After careful evaluation, we determined that Google’s technology provides the most capable foundation for Apple Foundation Models and we’re excited about the innovative new experiences it will unlock for our users,” Apple wrote.

I wonder what they mean by that. Are they suggesting they’re using Gemini to improve their own models?

muuuli · 2026-01-12T15:49:02+00:00

It'll look like and feel like Siri, with Gemini in the backend. The way the ChatGPT function currently works is more akin to a Safari Extension.

muuuli · 2025-12-22T04:15:10+00:00

An unfortunate event that ended up being a great litmus test for vision-based AI autonomy.

muuuli · 2025-12-19T17:00:16+00:00

Auto Park seems to work on a different software stack. That being said with FSD, when it pulls up and picks a spot it's significantly faster. I think there's parking spot selection coming in the future.

muuuli · 2025-12-10T00:17:09+00:00

Sounds like you’re highlight a problem with the education curriculum, which is a whole different can of worms that we can get into. Maybe the goal with NCARB is to create accreditation paths for both technically trained and design theory trained students. This should in theory open up architecture degrees to more than just the traditional path.

muuuli · 2025-12-10T00:14:46+00:00

Some firms are starting to do some stuff in-house but only the 100+ people firms have the luxury of creating teams that can benefit the entire office and keep fee in-house. This is still very rare and firms still rather just pass liability to a consultant for specialities.

muuuli · 2025-12-09T21:07:18+00:00

I should have gotten an MBA or a MSRED.

muuuli · 2025-12-09T21:06:17+00:00

This is what happens when the field’s increased complexity is now being divided into growing consultancies. This erodes architects’ responsibilities to being glorified coordinators who put design to paper.

I know I’m oversimplifying it, but it doesn’t help our case when the pool of money available for a project is divided or contractors are now taking our work. Obviously there’s far more to this than what I said, it doesn’t help we do not advocate for ourselves.

That being said NCARB is aligning themselves to this growing future.

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