The Apple iPhone 15 launch focused a lot on artificial intelligence with new chipsets

Apple spent a lot of time at the iPhone 15 launch event talking about the features of its products that use artificial intelligence, even if it did not mention artificial intelligence by name.

The Cupertino-based tech giant touted what was under the hood of the iPhone 15 lineup as well as the Apple Watch Series 9, particularly the chip that powers the devices.

Apple designs its own semiconductors for both. For the Apple Watch Series 9 and Apple Watch Ultra 2, Apple unveiled the S9 chip. Meanwhile, the iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max are powered by the A17 Pro chip.

While talking about these chips, Apple focused on the kind of features they support.

For example, the S9 allows requests to Apple’s voice assistant Siri to be processed on-device. This is an artificial intelligence process that typically occurs in the cloud and only when your watch is connected to the Internet. But as chips become more powerful, these AI operations can happen on the device itself.

This usually allows processes to be faster and more secure as your data is not transferred over the Internet.

But instead of talking about artificial intelligence, Apple focused on the usefulness of Siri on the device.

The Apple Watch Ultra 2 has a feature called Double Tap that lets you control features on the device by tapping your index finger and thumb together. Again, this requires AI processing.

“Apple doesn’t like to mention AI in conference calls or product events, leading to speculation that the company is lagging behind when it comes to taking advantage of the new paradigm,” Gene Munster, managing partner at Deepwater Asset Management, said in an article. Note on Tuesday.

“The reality is that Apple is aggressively pursuing artificial intelligence.”

Apple’s A17 Pro chip in the iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max is a 3nm semiconductor. The nanometer number refers to the size of each individual transistor on the chip. The smaller the transistor, the more of them can be packed into a single semiconductor. Typically, reducing the nanometer size can produce more robust and efficient chips.

The iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max are the only smartphones on the market with a 3nm chip.

Apple said this could help power features like more accurate predictive typing and camera technology, a process that again requires artificial intelligence.

“As more apps that take advantage of AI emerge, phones will be tasked with power supply, a dynamic that will make phones with older chips feel slow,” Munster said. “Chips are important when it comes to AI, and Apple is leading the way in building hardware to enable these features.”