Buying a new iPhone because of Apple Intelligence: ‘People are more likely to upgrade’

If you put the iPhone 15 next to the one from a few years ago, most people wouldn’t see many major differences. While small manufacturers like Nothing come up with all kinds of refreshing ideas to breathe new life into the image of a smartphone, Apple is almost desperately sticking to its well-known success formula. It even launched a web page earlier to inform customers about the differences, in case they couldn’t see them themselves. Analysts at Barclays were therefore initially skeptical about sales of the iPhone 16, which is due to be announced in September.

‘Clear catalyst’

In the meantime, Apple has pleasantly surprised many with the presentation of its AI functions Apple Intelligence. “AI for the rest of us”, was the message. With accessible and relevant functions, Apple showed the world its vision for AI – and that has made an impression. The company’s shares therefore appear to be a favorite of the American bank Morgan Stanley.

Analysts of the bank to call Apple Intelligence a ‘clear catalyst for a multi-year product upgrade cycle’. In other words: consumers will upgrade to a new iPhone more quickly in the coming years, because they can then use the new AI functions. According to the analysts, Apple will be able to continue to differentiate itself in the coming years by offering increasingly better chips that can better handle AI-related tasks.

Finally a better Siri?

The hope is mainly for a new, improved Siri; one that is not only used for scheduling a reminder or a kitchen timer, but is also actually useful. In addition to a new look, the new Siri could combine more information, so that it gets a better and more complete picture of you as a user.

Apple, at least, seems best positioned to fulfill that role; the company is still known for its strict privacy and security requirements, and that seems to be a clear prerequisite for many to simply entrust a company like Apple with all their personal information.

Microsoft and Google drop stitches

It was recently reported that Microsoft Recall, an AI tool that, like Siri, should be able to retrieve information, left much to be desired in terms of security. In addition, Google also dropped the ball when rolling out the AI ​​function in its search engine, AI Overviews, which advised users to eat stones or put glue on your pizza.

So Apple is taking it a bit easier and is starting with ‘only’ improving your texts or summarizing emails or notifications. And if you as a user still like to take a bit more risk, the American company prefers to leave that to third parties, such as OpenAI’s ChatGPT and perhaps Google Gemini in the future.

In Europe we still have to wait a bit

A week after Apple unveiled the new AI features, the company said it would not launch the functionality in the EU for the time being, saying it may not comply with EU rules on privacy and data usage.

There has been unrest between Apple and the EU for some time now due to alleged abuse of power by the iPhone maker. For example, Apple previously had to allow alternative app stores on iOS and was no longer allowed to prohibit developers from referring to their own payment platforms. The disagreement could therefore play a role in the announcement to postpone a release in the EU.

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