Apple's Struggles and Hopes in AI, iPad, Mac, and VisionPro
TapTechNews May 19 news, in addition to revealing the time of the new AirTag and the Mac product update M4, Mark Gurman from Bloomberg also commented on Apple's performance in the AI era.
Apple is struggling (flat-footed) in the generative AI race, and if it wants to catch up, it must change its strategy.
Gurman said that Apple is facing the biggest challenge during Tim Cook's CEO tenure: it must come from behind and win in the field of artificial intelligence.
Apple's main advantages lie in: funds, talents and a strong platform, but this requires Apple to make significant changes to its strategy and also needs some help from its AI competitors.
Although Apple may not agree, the company's AI-related functions (such as Siri) have been hindered by excessive reliance on the iPhone itself to process information and lack of data collection. Apple does this intentionally, which is also part of its efforts to protect privacy and security. But they don't always bring the best experience.
Apple will release new generative AI functions at the WWDC Global Developers Conference on June 10. In addition to the on-device AI functions, it will also provide cloud-based online AI services.
Gurman said that Apple will improve Siri's voice function to make it more conversational and add functions to help users deal with daily life - what the company calls proactive intelligence, including:
Automatically summarizing notifications on the iPhone
Quickly providing summaries of news articles
Transcribing voice memos
Improving existing functions of automatically filling calendars and recommending applications
Enhancing photos in an AI-editing way
One important missing is the chatbot: Apple's generative AI technology is not advanced enough to release its own ChatGPT or Gemini, so it will cooperate with OpenAI to introduce the technology of ChatGPT in iOS18.
Gurman believes this is just a stopgap measure, and Apple must eventually get rid of the cooperative way and build its own chatbot and deeply integrate it into the company's products.
Apple needs to speed up the pace of software iteration, but at least for next year, Apple has no plan to speed up the iOS release cycle.
The wrong attempt to distinguish the iPad from the Mac
The chip of the iPad Pro is better than most of the products in the Mac series, and the new keyboard case is also very great, and the screen is even beyond the reach of Apple's notebook computer display. However, the software of the iPad is still a weak link, and it's all Apple's fault.
Gurman believes that Apple should now:
Provide a better operating system for the iPad and enable it to run Mac applications
Equip the Mac with a touch screen and the new OLED display of the iPad Pro
These two devices may still be different: the Mac has a more powerful chip, a larger display, a built-in keyboard and trackpad, a fan suitable for heavy work, more interfaces and better battery life; the iPad is more portable, more suitable for playing games, more suitable for watching videos, and it is a device that can take photos and videos.
Apple pins its hopes on the Asian market to make VisionPro a success
Gurman said that VisionPro's performance in the United States is fairly good, but the real test may be when it enters the market where virtual reality technology is more popular. Apple is training overseas retail employees to sell VisionPro, and the initial overseas markets include China, South Korea, Japan, Hong Kong, Singapore, Canada, Australia, the United Kingdom, France and Germany, and will start to promote after the WWDC Global Developers Conference in June.
Consumers in Japan and other Asian countries may have higher comfort requirements for this mixed reality head-mounted display that combines virtual reality and augmented reality technologies.