Aug 8, 05:34 PM

Wedbush’s Dan Ives Says Apple Risks ‘BlackBerry Moment’ Without Bold AI Move

Apple faces what Wedbush Securities analyst Dan Ives calls a potential “BlackBerry moment” as generative artificial-intelligence reshapes the technology industry. In a research note circulated on 8 August, the long-time Apple bull said the company is “on a park bench drinking lemonade” while rivals accelerate AI investments. Ives urged Apple to make three immediate moves: spend up to about $30 billion to buy AI-search specialist Perplexity, deepen integration of Google’s Gemini large-language model across the iPhone ecosystem, and bring in outside AI leadership to revitalize product development. With an installed base of roughly 2.4 billion iOS devices, he argued, the company has a unique platform but risks squandering it without decisive action. The warning lands as CEO Tim Cook has told employees that AI is “as big or bigger” than the internet or smartphones and disclosed that 40 percent of last year’s 12,000 hires were in research and development. Cook also said Apple is “very open” to acquisitions and has bought about seven companies so far in 2025, supported by a cash pile of roughly $133 billion. Apple’s stock rose about 0.7 percent on Thursday, approaching its 200-day moving average, but debate is intensifying on Wall Street over whether incremental internal work is enough or whether a headline-grabbing AI deal is needed to keep Cupertino at the forefront of the next computing wave.