Apple seeks to catch up with Samsung, Google

Apple is discussing the possibility of acquiring Mistral AI and Perplexity to quickly improve AI features on iPhone and iPad.

iPhone 16 advertisement with Apple Intelligence in front of Apple store. Photo: Bloomberg .

According to sources from The Information , leaders at Apple are discussing the possibility of acquiring Mistral AI and Perplexity, two prominent startups in the field of AI model and chatbot development.

Services VP Eddy Cue is rumored to be a big supporter of the AI ​​acquisition strategy to bolster the services business. He previously supported Apple’s bids to acquire Netflix and Tesla, both of which CEO Tim Cook rejected.

In contrast to Cue, some other leaders at Apple, such as Vice President of Software Engineering Craig Federighi, are said to be reluctant to buy an AI startup. He believes that Apple can build its own AI technology.

Founded in 2023 and headquartered in Paris, France, Mistral AI specializes in developing open-source large language models (LLMs), designed to be smaller, faster, and easier to deploy than its competitors.

Mistral AI positions itself as an alternative to OpenAI and Anthropic in the European market. The company claims that despite being small and fast, its models still deliver strong performance in programming and inference tasks.

Backed by Nvidia, Mistral AI completed a Series B round last year that valued it at $6 billion . Earlier in August, the FT reported that the startup was in talks to raise another $1 billion at a $10 billion valuation.

Unlike Mistral AI, Perplexity is headquartered in the US and stands out with its AI-based search and question answering engine. Perplexity's product combines LLM and real-time information from the Internet, with responses that are clearly sourced.

Unlike traditional search engines, Perplexity prioritizes transparency when citing sources for answers. The company also positions itself as an alternative to Google Search when users want to look up and aggregate information.

Perplexity AI logo. Photo: Bloomberg .

Rumors say Apple is still hesitant to make the deal, which could cost billions of dollars. The article emphasizes that the company is not in favor of paying a lot of money for acquisitions.

In the past, there have only been two high-value acquisitions by Apple, including Beats ( $3 billion ) and Intel's wireless modem business ( $1 billion ).

In addition to the acquisition idea, 9to5Mac reports that Apple is asking its internal AI teams to compete against each other to select the best AI model. The company is also planning to partner with Anthropic and Google to integrate the model into Siri.

Compared to Google or Samsung, Apple is considered to be lagging behind in its strategy of deploying AI features on mobile devices.

Apple is embroiled in a US antitrust lawsuit over its $20 billion /year deal to make Google its default search engine. According to MacRumors , the company may have to buy an AI search startup to fill the void if it loses the lawsuit.

Apple has told investors that it is still focusing on its strategy of acquiring small AI companies. However, in its third-quarter financial report, CEO Tim Cook emphasized that the company is “very open to M&A (mergers and acquisitions) to accelerate progress.”

Source: https://znews.vn/apple-tim-cach-bat-kip-samsung-google-post1580323.html