What to know

  • Apple has acquired DarwinAI, a Canadian AI startup to further its own AI aspirations.
  • DarwinAI focuses on making AI systems function more efficiently.  
  • The acquisition will allow Apple to develop and integrate AI technologies into its products. 

After acquiring Canadian AI startup DarwinAI, now Apple, too, has a horse in the AI race. The acquisition may have come a little late, but it will, finally, allow Apple to focus on developing its own AI technologies and integrating them into its line of products and services. 

Now Apple too has a horse in the AI Race

A Bloomberg report has confirmed Apple’s purchase of DarwinAI, a Canadian startup specializing in the efficient operation of AI systems and enhancing visual inspection of manufacturing components. DarwinAI’s niche is particularly significant for Apple which may not want to take the same cloud-based AI system route as some other tech giants have and instead focus on on-device AI processing. 

The report mentions that the acquisition was completed sometime earlier this year. This could have been what spurred Apple CEO Tim Cook to hint, not too long ago, at the major AI developments on the horizon. 

Already Apple has started bringing in employees from DarwinAI to its own AI department, including lead AI researchers who helped build and develop DarwinAI thus far. 

In a fast-growing tech sector that’s already seen the likes of Microsoft and Google capitalize on the initial waves of generative AI, Apple has quite a bit of catching up to do. But if rumors and speculations are anything to go by, we can expect major announcements at the WWDC this June, including a deeper AI integration in the upcoming iOS 18.