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Apple Open to Acquisitions to Strengthen Its Position in the AI Race

ByHilary Ong

Aug 5, 2025

Apple Open to Acquisitions to Strengthen Its Position in the AI Race

Apple CEO Tim Cook announced during the company’s latest earnings call that Apple is “significantly” increasing its investment in artificial intelligence technologies. He emphasized that AI will be embedded across Apple’s devices, platforms, and the broader company.

“We are embedding it across our devices and platforms and across the company. We are also significantly growing our investments,” Cook said. He also confirmed a reallocation of a “fair number of” employees to focus on Apple Intelligence features.

Strong Earnings and AI Challenges

Apple celebrated a strong third fiscal quarter, reporting $94 billion in revenue from April to June 2025 — a 10% increase year over year. Despite this growth, Apple has faced criticism for being slow to innovate with AI, especially following a false start with an AI-powered Siri. The company has also reportedly lost several AI engineers to competitors like Meta in recent months.

Ahead of the earnings call, Apple revealed openness to acquisitions to accelerate its AI ambitions. The company completed seven acquisitions this year but described none as “huge in terms of dollar amount.” Cook noted, “We’re open to M&A that accelerates our roadmap,” though he did not specify any targets. Previous reports suggested Apple was eyeing AI search startup Perplexity and considering partnerships with Anthropic or OpenAI to improve Siri’s capabilities, but Apple has not confirmed these.

Apple execs stated that new Siri features will not launch until 2026.

Tariffs and New Product Launches

Cook also addressed the impact of U.S. tariffs on Apple’s business. The company paid $800 million in tariffs last quarter and expects to spend around $1.1 billion more between July and September, assuming no changes in tariff policies.

This upcoming period will likely include the launch of the iPhone 17 series and possibly other new devices. Apple also highlighted that the developer betas for iOS 26, macOS 26, and iPadOS 26 are the most popular it has ever released.

Apple celebrated a significant milestone, becoming only the second company to sell over three billion iPhones. Analysts believe Samsung reached this milestone between 2014 and 2024 but have likely sold more overall due to a longer handset production history.

Author’s Opinion

Apple is clearly stepping up its AI game after a slow start, with increased investment and openness to acquisitions showing a renewed focus. However, catching up to competitors like Meta and Google, who have been aggressively expanding AI capabilities for years, will be no easy feat. Apple’s cautious approach could pay off by prioritizing quality and integration across its ecosystem, but delays in Siri’s AI upgrades risk losing mindshare to faster movers. The company’s strength in hardware and loyal user base give it a solid foundation, yet the AI race demands both speed and innovation.


Featured image credit: Heute

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Hilary Ong

Hello, from one tech geek to another. Not your beloved TechCrunch writer, but a writer with an avid interest in the fast-paced tech scenes and all the latest tech mojo. I bring with me a unique take towards tech with a honed applied psychology perspective to make tech news digestible. In other words, I deliver tech news that is easy to read.

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