Siri handles more than 2.5 billion requests a day, Apple’s new CEO reportedly told colleagues. Now John Ternus wants it to do far more than set timers. In a closed-door meeting in recent weeks, he pressed Craig Federighi to speed up Apple’s Siri AI strategy, according to Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman.
Apple has not confirmed any of it. Everything here traces to Gurman’s Sunday “Power On” newsletter, which relies on anonymous sources. For more on the man at the center, see our look at Ternus’s first six weeks as Apple CEO.
What Ternus reportedly wants from the Siri AI strategy
The ask is simple and big. Gurman says Ternus wants Apple to “accelerate the company’s road map and move quickly beyond merely making necessary improvements to Siri,” as Gizmodo quotes him. Reports describe Ternus as frustrated. He sees reluctance to embrace AI with the urgency of competitors.
The goal is an agent. Gurman says Apple is exploring turning Siri into an assistant that can go off and get things done for you. Today, Siri can’t run long, multistep tasks in the background.
Ternus has already dropped hints in public. On a recent earnings call he called agentic AI capabilities “promising.” He also said Apple wants to do it in a way that protects security and privacy, per a summary of Bloomberg’s reporting. Apple’s pitch has always been that it does AI differently, and it can’t give that up now.
Here’s the twist: the man being pushed is the skeptic. Gurman writes that observers have seen Federighi as an AI skeptic. He’s wary of the privacy, security, societal and jobs questions the technology raises.
Some Software Engineering and design employees, per iClarified’s summary, describe his management as highly hands-on. They say that makes it hard for competing ideas to gain traction. Federighi reportedly plans on a 12 to 18 month timeframe, far shorter than the multiyear roadmaps hardware teams use.
Federighi took over Apple’s AI effort after John Giannandrea’s removal last year. He inherited a Siri project that had missed its promises. Gurman’s line, quoted by PYMNTS, sums up the tension: “the world has changed around Federighi, and around Apple itself.”
Another shake-up on deck for the Apple Siri overhaul?
Gurman also reports that Siri engineering chief Mike Rockwell is weighing an exit next year. If he leaves, his work on the Apple AI roadmap could go to Amar Subramanya, a Google veteran Apple hired last year. It could also go to Sebastien Marineau, a Federighi deputy. That is Gurman’s reporting alone and remains unconfirmed.
The same newsletter flags a shake-up in how Apple develops iOS 28. The full piece is paywalled, though, so the details beyond the lede are thin.
Not everyone buys the framing
Not every Apple watcher is convinced. AppleInsider argues the report contradicts itself and doesn’t match what’s been visible from the outside. Its case: Apple’s measured approach has spared it billions in AI losses that rivals have taken on.
That is a fair point. Apple also has money to spend, so cash isn’t the problem. Speed is.
Why the Siri AI strategy matters to you
Here’s the thing: Siri sits on hundreds of millions of iPhones in American pockets. That’s a lot of timers.
Will that assistant stay a voice that sets them? Or will it become one that books, buys and sorts things on its own? The answer will shape how you use your phone.
Apple isn’t due to deliver deeper Siri control of its apps until spring 2027. Some tasks are already running in the iOS 27.3 developer beta, however. Meanwhile, rivals aren’t standing still. Huawei unveiled HarmonyOS 7.
So the real question for Cupertino isn’t whether to build an agent. It’s whether the company famous for waiting until it’s right can afford to wait any longer.
