Tim Cook to employees: Apple must focus on AI

During the traditional earnings call, Tim Cook told investors that Apple might acquire AI startups. The CEO reiterated his intention to focus on artificial intelligence during a rare employee meeting, emphasizing that the company can win in this space.

Tim Cook is optimistic about AI

Apple is known for "inventing" the smartphone category with the first iPhone in 2007. It also brought several innovations to market before its competitors. In the field of artificial intelligence , however, it came in practically last, overtaken not only by Big Tech (Amazon, Google, Meta, Microsoft) but also by various startups (OpenAI, Anthropic, and others).

Apple Intelligence features are being gradually rolled out, but the new Siri isn't available yet. Speaking to employees, Tim Cook emphasized that the AI revolution is as big or bigger than the internet, smartphones, cloud computing, and apps. Apple has all it takes to win in this space.

The CEO emphasized that the company has rarely been first, as there was a PC before the Mac, there was a smartphone before the iPhone, there were many tablets before the iPad, there was an MP3 player before the iPod . But Apple invented the modern versions of these products and will do the same with AI.

During his speech, Cook urged employees to accelerate the integration of AI into their work and future products. Employees should commit to implementing AI tools more quickly and urge their managers and support teams to do the same.

We all already use artificial intelligence significantly, and we must do the same as a company. Not doing so would mean falling behind, and we can't do that.

Craig Federighi , head of the software engineering group, also attended the meeting. He explained that the initial goal was to develop a new version of Siri by combining two different architectures (the current one and another based on LLM). This hybrid approach didn't work, so a new architecture will be used for all of the assistant's capabilities. The new Siri is expected to be announced by spring 2026 .