Apple’s new iPhone 16, which will feature the A18 chip, leverages Arm’s latest next-generation V9 chip technology, reported the Financial Times, citing undisclosed sources with knowledge of the matter.
This marks a significant stride in Apple’s efforts to integrate advanced generative artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities into its smartphones.
Arm, which is a British semiconductor firm, has a long-term licensing agreement with Apple. The SoftBank-owned company’s V9 architecture, launched in 2021, generates twice the royalties compared to its predecessor, the V8, according to Arm CEO Rene Haas.
According to the publication, the adoption of Arm’s V9 architecture by Apple, whose iPhone sales account for nearly half of its total revenue, is a major boost for the chip designer.
Apple has already utilised the V9 architecture in its latest M4 chips for MacBooks. The company claims that these chips offer significant performance improvements and are expected to be featured in upcoming PC releases.
The decision to use the same architecture in its latest iPhone is part of Apple’s broader strategy to position itself as a leader in AI, as per the Financial Times. The company introduced a suite of features under “Apple Intelligence” in June 2024.
These features include a more intelligent Siri, AI-driven custom emoji creation, advanced photo editing tools, and a partnership with OpenAI that offers free access to ChatGPT.
Additionally, Apple has developed a Private Cloud Compute infrastructure to ensure user data security when it interacts with AI models.
The current AI features under Apple Intelligence are only available on the iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max, which house the A17 Pro chip based on Arm’s V8 architecture.
With the launch of iPhone 16, the company has indicated that it will introduce the features gradually, with regional and language-specific updates to follow.
A developer beta for iOS 18.1, which will bring Apple Intelligence to the iPhone, is currently underway.
Following its acquisition of Arm in 2016, SoftBank has increasingly focused on the intersection of AI and semiconductor technology.
The Japanese conglomerate recently expanded its portfolio by acquiring Graphcore, a company specialising in the design of intelligence processing units for AI applications. Prior to this, Softbank also adopted AI-driven customer service software. The solution was aimed at modifying customer voices to make them sound more amenable to agents solving their inquiries.
In 2023, SoftBank launched operations of its computing platform for the development of generative AI. Its subsidiary SB Intuitions also started leveraging this computing platform to begin the full-fledged development of homegrown large language models (LLMs) specialised for the Japanese language.
Arm, which went public in a highly successful IPO in September last year, has seen its shares rise by about 70% since the start of 2024. The company’s growth has been bolstered by its expansion into the PC, automotive, and industrial chip sectors, alongside the surge in investment in AI chips.
