Apple CEO Tim Cook made his third trip to China this year on November 25. In recent months, the US tech giant has been in talks with domestic companies to help bring Apple Intelligence to market. Last month, the AI ​​feature set was rolled out to iPhones and other products in the US.

According to FT sources, Apple is also considering operating its own language models in the market.

iphone 16 bloomberg
Apple has not been able to provide Apple Intelligence for iPhones in China. Photo: Bloomberg

However, a senior official at the Cyberspace Administration of China said that foreign companies like Apple would face a lengthy and complicated approval process if they wanted to launch their own models. Working with local partners and using an approved model is the best option.

Apple is trying to reinvent itself around AI, betting that consumers will upgrade their devices to access new features that don't work on older iPhone models.

In the US, Apple’s own models power features like Siri, writing posts, editing photos, and creating emojis, using a combination of on-device and cloud processing. For more complex queries, the company taps OpenAI’s models.

Apple has been in talks with Baidu, ByteDance and Moonshot, sources told the FT .

During a visit to Beijing last month, Tim Cook said Apple was “working hard” on the launch of Apple Intelligence in China. However, JPMorgan analyst Samik Chatterjee predicted that the regulatory process could push the launch of Apple Intelligence in China to the second half of 2025.

(According to FT)