Apple CEO John Ternus has used his first keynote to insist that the iPhone remains central to the company's product strategy for the AI era.
“There’s no product in the world better designed to be your intelligent personal hub than iPhone,” he said on Wednesday.
The remarks contrast with the approach of former CEO Tim Cook, who repeatedly tried to convince Wall Street that Apple was more than just the iPhone. They also rebut recent pundit claims that the smartphone's days are numbered.
Ternus has put the iPhone at the centre of his “intelligent personal assistant” strategy. The move echoes Steve Jobs' 2001 defence of the PC as a “digital hub” before the launch of the iPod.
“If you were designing the ideal version of this hub from scratch, how would you do it?” Ternus asked, citing a powerful processor, high-resolution cameras, persistent networking and on-device AI as key ingredients.