Apple CEO Tim Cook has recently confirmed that Apple is now “very open” to making bigger acquisitions in the AI space to accelerate its AI development roadmap. This marks a significant shift from Apple’s historically cautious approach to acquisitions. Cook emphasized that Apple is not constrained by the size of potential acquisition targets but focuses on whether a company can help speed up its AI efforts. While Apple has acquired about seven companies so far in 2025, those were relatively small deals; the company is open to much larger deals if they align with its AI acceleration goals.
This move is in response to growing pressure from Wall Street and investors who view Apple as falling behind rivals like Microsoft, Google, and Meta in AI innovation. There are reports that Apple has had internal discussions about acquiring Perplexity AI, a conversational search startup valued around $14-18 billion, which would be Apple’s largest acquisition by a wide margin compared to its prior largest deal, the $3 billion Beats acquisition in 2014.
In addition to considering large acquisitions, Apple plans to significantly grow its investments in AI, including reallocating resources internally and increasing capital expenditures on data centers, although it still uses a hybrid model that relies partially on third parties for infrastructure.
In summary, Tim Cook’s latest statements reflect Apple’s readiness to “open its wallet” for major AI acquisitions and ramp up investments to catch up with competitors, signaling a strategic acceleration of its AI ambitions in 2025.
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