Apple is reportedly in discussion with China's Baidu to bring the latter's advanced AI chatbot tech, ERNIE, to iPhones in the Chinese market. The move comes after Apple also discussed bringing Google's Gemini to power AI features on the iPhone earlier this week.
Baidu, which is widely recognized for its search engine dominance in China, has been a key player in the development of AI in the world's second-largest economy. China's strict and stringent compliance requirements might have forced Apple to form a more local partnership to bring AI features to the iPhone in China.
Last year, Chinese authorities implemented regulations mandating regulatory review of AI models before public release to ensure their alignment with government policies. ERNIE, launched in early 2023, is a ChatGPT-like model that features self-censorship in responses to sensitive political queries, such as about Chinese President Xi Jinping.
With Baidu already set as the default search engine on China's iPhones, Apple's potential expansion of this partnership to include AI on its devices as well is not a surprise. Notably, Samsung has integrated ERNIE into its Galaxy smartphones in China, which is in contrast with its use of Google's Gemini elsewhere.
It's also intriguing to consider how these partnerships will affect Apple's own generative AI efforts. Although CEO Tim Cook has confirmed that AI features will definitely come to the iPhone, those will likely be powered by proprietary AI models like Gemini rather than something developed in-house. That doesn't mean Apple is nowhere near using the "AI" buzzword to market its products. The company is touting its recently launched M3 MacBook Air as the "world's best consumer laptop for AI" while also showcasing the laptop's capability to efficiently handle large language models (LLMs) and diffusion models locally.
We're anticipating more news about Apple's AI strategy at the upcoming WWDC 2024 in June.
Source: WSJ (paywall)
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