\n<\/p>\n
Apple is looking to acquire AI chip companies as part of an effort to reduce its reliance on Nvidia for AI workloads, according to Information<\/em>.<\/p>\n Apple currently handles AI processing in its data centers using its own chips, but relies on Nvidia hardware stored within Google Cloud for more complex tasks, an arrangement that includes the Gemini model that powers a modified version of Siri. Apple’s AI server chip, internally called Baltra, was expected to ship this year but has been delayed, according to people said to be familiar with the project.<\/p>\n Apple has historically limited its purchases to deals in the hundreds of millions of dollars and avoided large acquisitions, but that trend appears to be changing. In January, Apple completed the purchase of Q.ai, an Israeli company that specializes in interpreting speech using facial micromovements, for nearly $2 billion, second only to the $3 billion Apple paid for Beats Electronics in 2014.<\/p>\n Apple also signaled a change in financial strategy during its latest quarterly earnings call, when CFO Kevan Parekh told analysts that the company would no longer be looking at a “cash neutral” position, a policy where it kept its cash reserves roughly in line with its total debt. Apple did not explain the reason for the change, although more flexibility could free up money for larger purchases.<\/p>\n Apple is reportedly pursuing the acquisition of AI companies that can help reduce AI models to be used more effectively on the iPhone. <\/p>\n It’s also worth noting that Apple’s in-house chip manufacturing capabilities come from acquisitions. In 2008, the company acquired PA Semi for $278 million, a deal that laid the foundation for the custom processors now used in many of their product lines.<\/p>\n Upcoming leadership changes may also bring an aggressive approach to problem solving, as hardware chief John Ternus is set to replace Tim Cook as CEO in September, and chip chief Johny Srouji has been given more responsibility over all of Apple’s hardware engineering, in addition to semiconductors.<\/p>\n Apple’s chip design team has generally focused on battery-powered mobile devices instead of the high-performance server chips needed to compete with Nvidia, a leading supplier of AI server hardware. That limitation became apparent during the development of the updated Siri, when engineers reportedly tried to use Google’s Gemini models on Apple’s server infrastructure but found that the chips, designed with Mac workloads in mind, could not handle a model of that scale. As a result, Apple had to process parts of the new Siri’s functionality using Nvidia chips within Google’s cloud infrastructure.<\/p>\n Getting information about external chips will complement the work already done internally. Apple is currently developing a server chip based on the M5 Ultra chip, according to Bloomberg<\/em>while the future M7 Ultra chip is reportedly intended to significantly improve AI performance to a level that could begin to compete with Nvidia’s Blackwell chip. The M7 Ultra is expected to support up to 1.5TB of memory, which is almost double the capacity of the M5 Ultra, though. Bloomberg<\/em> he added that the server chip based on the M7 Ultra is unlikely to be ready before 2029.<\/p>\n The acquisition represents just one avenue that Apple is pursuing to reduce its reliance on Nvidia. Information<\/em> first reported Apple and Broadcom’s AI server chip collaboration in 2024, and Broadcom confirmed in a securities filing last week that the companies have extended that partnership to 2031.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Apple is looking to acquire AI chip companies as part of an effort to reduce its reliance on Nvidia for AI workloads, according to Information. Apple currently handles AI processing in its data centers using its own chips, but relies on Nvidia hardware stored within Google Cloud for more complex tasks, an arrangement that includes […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":16261,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-16260","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-how-to-tips"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.runwayritz.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16260","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.runwayritz.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.runwayritz.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.runwayritz.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.runwayritz.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16260"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.runwayritz.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16260\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16262,"href":"https:\/\/www.runwayritz.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16260\/revisions\/16262"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.runwayritz.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16261"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.runwayritz.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16260"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.runwayritz.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16260"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.runwayritz.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16260"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}