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Apple Faces Shareholder Lawsuit Over Alleged Overstatement of AI Progress

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Apple (AAPL.O) was sued on Friday by shareholders in a proposed securities fraud class action accusing the company of overstating its progress in integrating advanced artificial intelligence into its Siri voice assistant. The lawsuit claims this misrepresentation negatively impacted iPhone sales and Apple’s stock price.

The complaint covers shareholders who experienced significant losses, potentially amounting to hundreds of billions of dollars, over the year ending June 9, 2025. During that period, Apple introduced several product features and aesthetic upgrades but kept AI advancements modest.

Apple has not yet responded to requests for comment. The lawsuit names CEO Tim Cook, Chief Financial Officer Kevan Parekh, and former CFO Luca Maestri as defendants. The case was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California in San Francisco.

Shareholders, led by Eric Tucker, argue that at Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference in June 2024, the company implied that AI would play a major role in the iPhone 16. Apple launched “Apple Intelligence,” which was marketed as enhancing Siri’s power and user-friendliness. However, the plaintiffs contend that Apple did not have a functional prototype of AI-based Siri features and could not reasonably expect those features to be ready for the iPhone 16 launch.

The lawsuit states that the reality started to become apparent on March 7, 2025, when Apple announced delays to some Siri upgrades until 2026. This was further reinforced at the June 9 Worldwide Developers Conference when analysts expressed disappointment with Apple’s AI progress.

Since hitting a record high on December 26, 2024, Apple shares have fallen nearly 25%, erasing roughly $900 billion in market value.

The case is identified as Tucker v. Apple Inc et al, U.S. District Court, Northern District of California, No. 25-05197.

Apple Explores Potential Acquisition of AI Startup Perplexity, Bloomberg Reports

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Apple (AAPL.O) executives have held early internal discussions about possibly bidding for artificial intelligence startup Perplexity, according to a Bloomberg News report on Friday citing sources familiar with the matter. However, the talks are in preliminary stages and may not result in an offer, with no direct communication reported between Apple and Perplexity management.

Perplexity stated it has no knowledge of any current or future merger and acquisition discussions involving the company. Apple did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

This potential move aligns with a broader trend of major tech companies ramping up investments in AI technologies to strengthen their competitive edge amid growing demand for AI-powered services. Bloomberg also reported that Meta Platforms (META.O) had attempted to acquire Perplexity earlier this year. Meta recently announced a $14.8 billion investment in Scale AI and appointed its CEO, Alexandr Wang, to lead a new superintelligence division.

Apple’s head of mergers and acquisitions, Adrian Perica, has reportedly discussed the possibility with services chief Eddy Cue and top AI leaders. The company aims to integrate AI-driven search functionalities, like those from Perplexity AI, into its Safari browser, which could reduce its reliance on Alphabet’s (GOOGL.O) Google — a longtime default search partner.

This shift comes amid ongoing U.S. Department of Justice efforts to limit Google’s dominance in online search, including proposals to ban payments that secure default search engine status. While traditional search engines like Google remain dominant globally, AI-powered search tools such as Perplexity and ChatGPT are gaining traction, particularly among younger users.

Perplexity recently completed a funding round valuing the startup at $14 billion, making any acquisition deal at that scale potentially Apple’s largest to date. The Nvidia-backed company offers AI search services that provide users with summarized information, similar to OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Google’s Gemini.

Apple Explores Using AI to Accelerate Chip Design, Says Executive

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Apple is exploring the use of generative artificial intelligence (AI) to speed up the design of its custom chips, a senior hardware technology executive revealed during a recent speech.

Johny Srouji, Apple’s senior vice president of hardware technologies, spoke last month in Belgium while receiving an award from Imec, a semiconductor research and development group that collaborates with leading chipmakers worldwide.

In his speech, Srouji traced Apple’s journey in chip design from the introduction of the first A4 chip in the iPhone back in 2010 to the latest processors powering Mac desktop computers and the Vision Pro headset. He emphasized that using the most advanced design tools is essential to meet the growing complexity of Apple’s chips.

He highlighted the importance of electronic design automation (EDA) software, developed by companies like Cadence Design Systems and Synopsys, which are increasingly integrating AI technologies into their platforms. According to Srouji, generative AI has strong potential to boost productivity by enabling more chip design work in less time.

Srouji also reflected on Apple’s bold strategic decisions, especially the 2020 transition of its Mac computers from Intel processors to its own Apple Silicon chips. The move involved no fallback plans or partial rollouts, reflecting Apple’s commitment to fully owning the chip design and software integration process.

“Moving the Mac to Apple Silicon was a huge bet for us. There was no backup plan, no split-the lineup plan, so we went all in, including a monumental software effort,” Srouji said.