Key Morningstar metrics for AppleFair Value Estimate: $240.00Morningstar Rating: ★★Morningstar Economic Moat Rating: WideMorningstar Uncertainty Rating: Medium

On Jan. 12, Google announced that Apple’s AAPL next-generation artificial intelligence models will be based on Gemini models in a multiyear partnership. Gemini will now be a foundational piece of Apple Intelligence and will underpin the next-generation Siri voice assistant, which is set to launch in 2026.

Why it matters: This is the catalyst Apple needs to revamp its AI strategy, which has promised much and delivered little so far. Gemini should allow Apple’s vision to bear out. We believe a competitive—if not leading—AI feature suite will reinforce Apple’s wide-moat mobile device ecosystem.

We like Apple’s choice to partner, rather than build generative AI models from the ground up. Apple’s strength is building software applications that users love. To us, the firm doesn’t need to develop frontier models, but rather should use a strong model like Gemini to undergird compelling features.Apple’s brand of security and privacy should remain intact, as it will use Gemini instances on its own servers in its own data centers via its Private Cloud Compute offering for AI processing. We expect users will be able to opt in to sharing prompts with Gemini directly, as well.

The bottom line: We maintain our $240 fair value estimate for wide-moat Apple, as the announcement was an expected part of our long-term thesis. Shares are fairly valued. The stock didn’t move much on the announcement, implying the market already priced in the partnership.

To us, this will protect Apple’s ecosystem and existing growth trajectory, rather than spur a growth cycle. To drive a higher valuation, we would need to see Gemini spur a hardware refresh cycle for the iPhone.

Bulls say: If the Gemini partnership quickly enables new, larger models for Apple that require greater memory to run compelling features, we could see a stronger upcycle. This would entail consumers buying the newest phones to be able to use new AI-generated features.

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