Apple Loop: iPhone 16 design leaks, new M4 MacBook Pro, Apple’s open-source AI

Updated June 23 with details on Apple Intelligence in the EU and the M4 release schedule.

A look back at this week’s news and headlines from Apple, including the latest iPhone 16 leaks, the iPhone’s AI limitations, a new MacBook Pro for Christmas, Apple’s open-source AI, when Siri will get Apple Intelligence, an iPhone AI supercycle, and what happened to Apple’s i?

Apple Loop reminds you of some of the many discussions surrounding Apple over the past seven days. You can also read my weekly roundup of Android news here on Forbes.

Notes on the iPhone 16 case

A whole bunch of cases have been spotted this week for the iPhone 16 that were unveiled this week. While they don’t show the inner workings of the next-generation iPhones, they do give us more potential information about the camera and its use in relation to Apple’s spatial computing plans:

“The photos again suggest a subtly revised design of the iPhone 16, which features two vertically aligned camera lenses. One theory is that this arrangement is intended to enable spatial video recording capabilities for Apple’s Vision Pro mixed reality headset, even on the base models. For optimal spatial capture, the lenses must be aligned horizontally, mimicking the position of the human eyes.”

(TechNetbooks).

Limitations of iPhone AI

Apple has confirmed that of the current iPhones, only the iPhone 15 Pro and 15 Pro Max will support Apple Intelligence AI. This is due to a mix of memory, processor and bandwidth on the board, as Apple’s John Giannandrea recently explained in a “Talk Show” podcast:

“So when you run these models at runtime, it’s called inference, and inference of large language models is incredibly computationally intensive. So it’s a combination of bandwidth in the device, the size of the Apple Neural Engine, and the power of the device to actually run these models fast enough to make them useful. In theory, you could run these models on a very old device, but it would be so slow that it wouldn’t be useful.”

(Forbes).

M4 MacBook Pro before Christmas

Apple has taken the surprising step of showcasing the latest M4 chip in the iPad Pro rather than a Mac. Eventually, the macOS family will launch the M4, and the MacBook Pro will likely be first in line:

“The entry-level 14-inch MacBook Pro is expected to get an M4 chip, while the 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pro models will be updated with M4 Pro and M4 Max chips. The Mac mini will get M4 and M4 Pro chips. The MacBook Air, Mac Studio, and Mac Pro models won’t be updated with M4 chips until 2025, and it’s not yet clear when the iMac might get an update with the updated chip technology.”

(MacRumors).

Updated June 23 with Apple’s M4 release schedule.

Apple’s M4 plans for the Mac family

More details on Apple’s adoption of the M4 chipset across the Mac family were released by Bloomberg this weekend. As reported earlier this week, the MacBook Pro line will introduce the M4 on Mac hardware in late 2024. Disappointingly, the MacBook Air won’t be updated to M4 until spring 2025:

“M4-based Mac Pro and Mac Studio remain on schedule for the second half of next year. There has been speculation online about when to expect the M4 Mac line, which I first discussed months ago. After looking around, I see no change in the schedule. The M4 iMacs, MacBook Pros (low- and high-end versions), and Mac Minis (also low- and high-end models) are scheduled to arrive between late 2024 and early 2025.”

(Bloomberg).

Apple’s open-source AI efforts

Although Apple has not yet publicly shipped its AI software, Apple Intelligence, some of its AI efforts are already available. Hugging Face is an online open-source service that shares machine learning models and datasets. Apple has uploaded another 20 models to the service, in addition to those uploaded earlier this year:

“Apple has made great strides in its efforts to equip developers with cutting-edge on-device AI capabilities. The tech giant recently released 20 new Core ML models and 4 datasets on Hugging Face, a leading community platform for sharing AI models and code.

(VentureBeat).

AI will be late to the iPhone party

And what about the public launch of Apple Intelligence? That will take longer than expected. While iOS 18 will ship with the iPhone 16 and 16 Pro in September, and there will be a later release for older iPhones, Apple Intelligence may not be available until early 2025:

“Siri in iOS 18 will have some new bells and whistles in September, including a new user interface that has a light on the edge of the screen…[but] We’ll have to wait until next year to see Apple’s most significant improvements to Siri. An iOS 18 update in 2025 should bring the following improvements to Apple’s virtual assistant:

(MacRumors).

Update June 22: Details on Apple Intelligence availability in the EU.

Apple Intelligence may not be delivered in the EU

Speaking to the Financial Times this weekend, an Apple spokesperson outlined why Apple Intelligence is not being fully released in the EU. It boils down to the DMA’s interactions with iOS and iPadOS. There is no clear indication as to whether Apple Intelligence would satisfy regulators or whether it would lead to further investigations. Crucially, this will not be decided before any release. Given the threat of a significant fine, Apple has declined to take the risk at this stage:

“Due to the regulatory uncertainties brought about by the Digital Markets Act,” Apple said on Friday, “we do not believe we will be able to launch three of these features – iPhone mirroring, SharePlay screen sharing extensions and Apple Intelligence – to our EU users this year.”

(Financial Times).

An AI dreams of a supercycle

With the introduction of AI to the iPhone (no matter when it comes), Apple is expected to sell a lot of AI-enabled iPhones. Since there is very little backwards compatibility, will this trigger a “supercycle” of iPhone sales? Analysts at Wedbush believe it will:

“… with the launch of Apple’s AI strategy, this will trigger a long-awaited supercycle in Cupertino, where we estimate that 270 million of the world’s 1.5 billion iPhones in the “golden installed base” will not upgrade their smartphones for more than 4 years:

(9to5Mac).

And finally…

Once upon a time, everything started with “i.” Today, all product names start with “Apple.” What’s going on? Of course, there’s a new Reddit discussion this week about Apple’s branding, with many theories about how it works, including this one:

“Using Apple in the name is a marketing ploy to ensure brand recognition. Acura learned this the hard way in the ’90s when they started calling their cars Legend and Integra and nobody knew who made them. Renaming their cars RDX, MDX, etc. forced people to bring ‘Acura’ back into the conversation. I think Apple does this too.”

(Medium via Reddit).

Apple Loop brings you the highlights every weekend for seven days here on Forbes. Don’t forget to follow me so you don’t miss any future coverage. You can read last week’s Apple Loop here, or this week’s edition of Loop’s sister column, Android Circuit, is also available on Forbes.