Why Samsung is the real winner of the Apple Gemini deal

If you can't beat them, join them. Apple saw this writing on the wall when its own efforts to develop an AI model that could rival the best of what was already out there faltered. Most notably, the company's promised Siri with significant AI enhancements failed to deliver on expectations as the underlying AI tech just wasn't as good.

Apple did link up with OpenAI early only to bring some of its ChatGPT magic to its ‘Apple Intelligence' suite of AI features. That collaboration still stands, but the partner Apple has now chosen to strengthen the foundation has already proven the calibre of its AI models on Samsung devices.

It has only been a few days since Apple announced that it would use Google's Gemini models for its enhanced Siri. This multi-year deal will see Google's Gemini models become a major pillar for Apple Foundation Models, a deal that's probably worth billions of dollars.

This wasn't a deal that many saw coming. Apple typically doesn't enter into arrangements like these with other companies as it prefers to do much of the work on such technologies in-house. It was quickly running out of options, though. Others were racing ahead while Apple's own work on AI was falling short.

Despite a slow start, Gemini has quickly emerged as one of the leading AI models in the industry. Samsung saw its potential quite early on. Gemini saw deep integration with the Galaxy S24 series as Samsung began its Galaxy AI push in earnest.

This integration was only strengthened with the Galaxy S25 series and the new foldables last year, all of which made more space for Gemini AI features which were offered as part and parcel of the Galaxy AI suite.

It was a pretty big vote of confidence from Samsung when it threw its weight behind Gemini at a time when it felt that OpenAI's ChatGPT would come to define the future of consumer-facing AI. There were questions at that time about Google's ability to innovate in the fast-moving realm of AI, because there was so much hype around what ChatGPT was making it possible to achieve.

Gemini truly came into its own last year as Google expanded its capabilities and improved the model significantly, much to OpenAI's detriment. The narrative quickly shifted and Google's stock soared as the sentiment became apparent that Google wasn't lagging behind in the AI race, rather, it was leading it.

Samsung's declared approach to AI has been one of collaboration. The company never said that it wanted to go at it alone. It made it clear from the get go that delivering powerful AI experiences to consumers will require partnerships and collaborations with other companies in the industry. Only then could the pace of innovation could be kept up and the true potential of mobile AI be realized.

Consequently, Gemini got distribution on one of the world's top smartphone vendors and the biggest Android device maker in the world. That distribution brought with it endless amounts of users and a treasure trove of data that would have gone into making the Gemini model better on mobile devices.

This goes to show that it took Apple more than two years to realize what Samsung knew from day one, that Google had the goods and Gemini was a force to be reckoned with. That legitimacy that it provided to Gemini has now compounded with Apple picking it over all of the other solutions in the market, effectively declaring that Samsung was right to become an early backer of Gemini.

It also helps hand Samsung a perception win. Samsung understood the landscape better than Apple and made the right decisions much earlier. While it's not known how the negotiations between Apple and Google played out for this deal, the difference would have been stark, since Samsung was one of the early adopters while Apple went for Gemini at the height of its popularity.

Ultimately, it's Google's win for the taking. Gemini now powers AI features on both Samsung and Apple devices, the two leading global device makers, a distinction that not many other AI companies can claim for themselves.