Apple and Google are seemingly entering into a symbiotic relationship, where the former has used its unparalleled financial heft to gain access to the latter's very capable Gemini AI models. And these mutual synergies were apparently hefty enough to merit a dedicated shout-out and prime airtime for Apple at Google's Cloud Next 2026 event.
Apple has just become one of Google Cloud's most important customers
Google used Apple as a very important and lucrative prop to showcase the strength of its Gemini AI models at the just-concluded Google Cloud Next 2026 event.
This comes as the Cupertino-based tech giant recently inked a secretive deal with Google that might be worth as much as $5 billion from the get-go, and is slated to become progressively more lucrative with time.
Under the terms of the deal, Apple will pay Google around $1 billion per year as a licensing fee of sorts for deploying a gigantic 1.2-trillion-parameter custom Gemini AI model on Apple's private servers, where the model would help process the more complex AI queries by using encrypted and stateless data to maintain user privacy.
What's more, Apple's revamped chatbot Siri, which will launch with iOS 27, is slated to run on Google's own TPUs and cloud infrastructure, albeit under Apple's ownership. The iPhone manufacturer insists that the arrangement would not result in a change in Apple's stringent privacy-related safeguards.
The chatbot Siri will reportedly leverage a much more advanced version of Google's Gemini model, known internally as Apple Foundation Models version 11. According to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman, the model is expected to be competitive with Gemini 3.
Against this lucrative backdrop, it is hardly a surprise that Google would try to give the iPhone manufacturer a dedicated spotlight at its cloud-focused event.
About the author: Writing is my one incontrovertible passion. Over the past six years, he has authored over 2,200 distinct articles on financial and tech-related topics, spanning nearly 1 million words. And he has been a member of Wcctech mobile team since 2025. As an alumnus of the University of Toronto, Rotman Commerce Program, I bring nuance, in-depth knowledge, and a unique perspective to every topic that I cover. When I'm not writing, I'm traveling the world, exploring hidden confectionaries and restaurants as an aspiring food connoisseur.
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