Apple & Google symbiosis

Apple and Google have a good working relationship. For example, Google pays Apple around $20 billion a year to be the default search engine on Apple devices. In return, Apple uses Google Cloud for all of its online storage.

Yesterday, Reuters reported that Apple used Google's tensor processing unit (TPU) chips to train some of the AI functionality coming to Apple devices in October. The decision is notable because they didn't use Nvidia chips and because it probably means that Apple will be more entrenched in Google's ecosystem.

From my understanding, companies use these less powerful, non-Nvidia chips for more basic AI activities. The Nvidia chips are too expensive and too difficult to get hold of to use for anything but very high-end processing.

Given Apple and Google's relationship, it is interesting that Apple has opted to use OpenAI for some of its on-device functionality instead of Google's Gemini. Some analysts speculate that Apple, in time, will give users the option of which AI engine they want to use.