In this edition we’ll be covering…
Apple's $1B annual deal to power Siri with Google's Gemini
The great AI shopping agent showdown between Amazon and Perplexity
A tutorial on using Gemini Canvas to create instant presentations
5 trending AI signals from the week
3 AI tools to sharpen your productivity
And much more…
The Latest in AI
Apple’s $1B Siri Rescue Mission
Apple just admitted what we all knew: Siri needed help. Big help.
Bloomberg reports that Apple is finalizing a deal to pay Google roughly $1 BILLION annually for a custom version of Gemini to power a completely overhauled Siri coming in spring 2026.
The model Apple's getting? A monster 1.2 trillion-parameter beast that's eight times more complex than Apple's current systems…
What's happening here?
Apple evaluated both Google and Anthropic for the new Siri, but chose Google for better financial terms. Anthropic would have cost $1.5 billion per year.
The deal is a stopgap solution until Apple's own AI systems mature enough to handle complex tasks. Google's Gemini will run on Apple's private cloud servers while Apple's models continue handling on-device personal data.
This is separate from search – Google isn't becoming Siri's search engine. The partnership focuses purely on powering Siri's intelligence and task-handling capabilities.
Apple won't advertise Google's involvement – they'll market the upgraded Siri as purely Apple technology, even though Google's AI is doing the heavy lifting behind the scenes.
So What?
After years of Siri being the punchline of voice assistant jokes, Apple is finally acknowledging it can't catch up alone. The company that built its brand on doing everything in-house is now outsourcing its AI brain to Google.
The irony? Apple already pays Google $20 billion annually to be Safari's default search engine. Now they're adding another billion to that tab just to make Siri competitive again.
Rivals like Amazon and Google already upgraded their assistants with AI over a year ago. Apple's 2026 timeline means they'll be two years behind, even with Google's help. That's an eternity in the AI race.
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Industry Intel
Amazon Tells Perplexity to Back Off its Shopping Cart
Amazon just drew a line in the sand for AI shopping agents, and Perplexity isn't happy about it.
The ecommerce giant sent Perplexity an "aggressive legal threat" demanding they stop letting their Comet browser buy products on Amazon for customers. Perplexity fired back with a blog post accusing Amazon of "bullying" and blocking innovation.
The battle heats up:
Comet's agentic AI feature can browse websites, find products, and complete purchases on your behalf – including on Amazon. But Amazon never gave permission for this.
Amazon says third-party apps that purchase products for customers "should respect service provider decisions whether or not to participate," claiming Comet provides a "significantly degraded shopping experience."
Perplexity calls it hypocrisy – Amazon CEO Andy Jassy said during an earnings call last week that the company expects to "partner with third-party agents" over time. Perplexity argues: "Amazon should love this. Easier shopping means more transactions."
So What?
Every major retailer built their empire on controlling the customer experience – showing you ads, pushing recommendations, and nudging you toward higher-margin products.
But, AI agents like Comet bypass all of that. They go straight to the best product for your needs, no sponsored listings or "Frequently bought together" manipulation required. That terrifies retailers who've spent decades perfecting the art of the upsell.
Amazon's fighting to protect its walled garden, but the genie's out of the bottle. If not Perplexity, another AI agent will come along that users prefer over Amazon's cluttered shopping experience. The question isn't if AI will change online shopping – it's whether Amazon adapts or gets disrupted.
Get Your Hands Dirty!
Turn Your Ideas Into Slides in Seconds with Gemini Canvas
Google MIGHT have just made the endless slides creation problem disappear.
Gemini Canvas now lets you generate complete slide decks from a simple prompt or uploaded document. No more wrestling with templates, themes, or trying to make your bullet points look professional.
Here's how to use it:
1. Open Gemini and start a Canvas
Go to gemini.google.com and sign in
Toggle the Canvas tool below the message box
You're now in Gemini's interactive workspace
2. Generate your presentation
You have two options:
Option A: Prompt-based creation Simply type what you want. Examples:
"Create a 10-slide presentation on the benefits of remote work"
"Make a pitch deck for a sustainable fashion startup"
"Build a training presentation on cybersecurity best practices"
Option B: Document upload Upload any file (doc, PDF, spreadsheet, research paper) and ask:
"Turn this research paper into a presentation"
"Create slides based on these meeting notes"
"Make a pitch deck from this business plan"
3. Review and refine
Canvas will generate your slides complete with:
Professional themes and layouts
Relevant visuals and graphics
Proper formatting and structure
Don't like something? Just tell Gemini:
"Make this more visual"
"Add more data to slide 3"
"Change the color scheme to blue"
4. Export to Google Slides
Once you're happy, click the export button and your presentation opens directly in Google Slides, where you can make final tweaks or share with your team.
The feature is rolling out now to all Gemini users. If you don't see it yet, check back in a few days.
Quick Bites
Stay updated with our favorite highlights, dive in for a full flavor of the coverage!
NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang warned that "China is going to win the AI race" if the U.S. continues restricting advanced chip exports, arguing that blocking China means losing half the world's AI developers.
OpenAI's Sora AI video generator launched on Android in the U.S., Canada, Japan, Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, and Vietnam after a month as iOS-only.
Vanderbilt researchers developed MAGE, a protein language model that can design functional human antibodies against emerging viral threats like RSV and bird flu faster than traditional methods.
New research from UT Arlington argues that AI-generated art should include embedded data files that credit the original artists whose work was used in the AI generation process.
NVIDIA and Qualcomm Ventures have joined a growing coalition of U.S. and Indian investors backing India’s deep tech startups.
Trending Tools
📊 Google Gemini Canvas – Turn any idea or document into a polished presentation in seconds with AI-powered slide generation.
🤖 GPT-Trainer – Build custom AI chatbots trained on your own data without writing a single line of code.
🕵️ SlopOrNot.ai – Instantly detect whether content was written by AI or a human with this simple detection tool.
Until we Type Again…
Thank you for reading yet another edition of Digestibly!
Reyhan
Early AI leader, advises Fortune 500 companies on AI Development, LLMOps, AI strategy, speaks (for fun) on practical AI. Turns cutting-edge theory into workflows teams can ship today.
Kevin
Ex-AWS SageMaker/Bedrock lead. Shipped infra powering 1M+ devices and $2.5M ARR. Obsessed with high-throughput, low-latency systems— and brings that discipline to every Digestibly release.