The iPhone maker Foxconn has raised its full-year forecast from neutral to “robust growth” thanks to a stronger AI server demand in 2024. With Apple expected to announce Artificial intelligence features with iOS 18 and later this year with the iPhone 16, this could be the biggest hint yet at this change.
According to Nikkei Asia, Foxconn Chairman Young Liu said, “Revenue from AI servers is estimated to climb 40% year-on-year, while revenue from graphic processing unit modules will jump by a triple-digit percentage.” Overall, AI server-related revenue will account for 40% of Foxconn’s total server business in 2024, up from 30% in 2023.
Interestingly, Haitong Securities analyst Jeff Pu and TrendForce have already reported that Apple was building several AI servers in 2023, with more expected for this year, as the company aims for a big AI push.
Last year, The Information shared that Cupertino is also spending millions of dollars daily to train its large-language models – LLM for short.
While the publication said most of this investment would focus on AppleCare customers, the Siri team plans to incorporate these language models to make complex shortcut integrations much more accessible.
Here are some of the Apple AI features expected for this year
Bloomberg‘s Mark Gurman also corroborated with Jeff Pu and The Information, as he also believes generative AI will be a massive part of iOS 18 and the iPhone 16. These are some use cases for Apple’s AI:
- Auto-summarizing and auto-complete features for core apps and productivity software (Pages, Keynote). This was also rumored by leaker yeux1122, which says code on iOS 18 suggests this function.
- Better playlist creation in Apple Music
- Siri (a big overall overhaul with a focus on AI)
- Code completion in a new version of Xcode for developers
- AppleCare tools to assist employees in helping customers with troubleshooting
Now, with Foxconn also betting AI servers will be a big part of its revenue, it’s yet another hint that this could mean a big year for Artificial Intelligence not only for the iPhone maker but for Apple itself.
