The Fruity Cargo Cult Apple will use Google’s Gemini AI model to power a more personalised Siri coming this year, which is a polite way of saying it could not get its own house in order.
Google and Apple announced on Monday: “After careful evaluation, Apple determined that Google’s Al technology provides the most capable foundation for Apple Foundation Models and is excited about the innovative new experiences it will unlock for Apple users.”
CNBC first reported the multiyear partnership, which lets Job’s Mob lean on Google Gemini and Google’s cloud technology for future models. Apple and Google say: “These models will help power future Apple Intelligence features, including a more personalised Siri coming this year.”
Job’s Mob is insisting Apple Intelligence will still run on Apple devices and Private Cloud Compute, as if the location of the plumbing matters when the brain is rented. It has spent the past year trying to bolt AI onto Siri so it can perform actions on your behalf and understand personal context, then had to delay the update last March after admitting it was taking “longer than we thought.”
That delay landed badly because the company has been criticised for failing to manage its AI push, even as its fan club has been pushing the line that it has been doing AI all along. The gap between the marketing sermon and the shipping schedule has been the real story, and this deal makes it harder to pretend otherwise.
Bloomberg reported that Job’s Mob considered using a custom version of Gemini for Siri features, including “World Knowledge Answers”, which would use web results to generate AI summaries. Google launched Gemini 3 in November, and it topped AI leaderboards, so Jobs’ Mob decided the fastest route to a “smart” Siri was to borrow someone else’s homework.
Job’s Mob also reshuffled its AI leadership, replacing Apple AI chief John Giannandrea with Apple Vision Pro head Mike Rockwell, according to Bloomberg. Giannandrea stepped down last month, and Apple CEO Tim Cook has been talking up future integrations after the company reportedly explored Anthropic and Perplexity as well as its partnership with OpenAI.
