The dazzling intruder - have you ever seen what chess looks like in the business world?
Your smartphone - the device that was once the pinnacle of innovation and the pride of manufacturers, is becoming before our eyes an expensive plastic and glass casing that merely holds the real thing:
The brain!
Consumers have long stopped buying the stories of "another camera with more pixels".
The new game is "uncomfortable neighborhood," where hardware manufacturers like Apple and Samsung find themselves reluctantly hosting powerful tenants like Google Gemini and Perplexity.
This is not a harmonious collaboration - this is a war for the home disguised as customer service.
When apps become redundant?
For a decade, the app store was the manufacturers' cash cow, they took a 30% cut on everything you bought.
Now - as AI models become the "gateway" through which the user does everything - from searching for a flight to paying bills - this structure is about to collapse.
If AI is the one executing commands - the user no longer needs to enter the Booking or Wolt app.
The economic implication is simply an earthquake - the app store's historical revenue model is in existential danger, and control passes to whoever holds the language model - not to whoever assembled the screen.
Google's strategy: to buy power with cash
Google is not waiting for the market to decide.
It is acting with dark aggression and simply pouring billions into Samsung to ensure that Gemini - will be the default.
Note that this is exactly the same model in which it paid Apple tens of billions to be the search engine in "Safari".
Google's goal is not immediate profit from device sales - it wants your data and "touch points".
Samsung is just a conduit for information transfer - as AI deepens its grip on search and command execution, Google's bargaining power against manufacturers will skyrocket, and they will find themselves at a disadvantage against the new "tenant" they themselves - invited into the living room!
The desperate attempt at rebellion - small models on limited hardware
Manufacturers are not stupid.
They understand that they are on their way to becoming subcontractors for edge hardware, their response is an attempt to develop "on-device AI" using small language models.
The idea is to reduce dependence on Google or OpenAI servers.
With all due respect to Apple or Samsung processors - there's a limit to how much power can be crammed into a pants pocket, the technical limitations of current operating systems and hardware are like trying to run a jet engine inside a family car.
It might work, but will it defeat the monsters running in the cloud?
Life after the smartphone
AI companies are already sensing the end of the smartphone era and are looking for escape routes.
OpenAI is partnering with Jony Ive - the man who designed the original iPhone, to build dedicated hardware that will be entirely AI.
And Meta? It's already there with its smart Ray-Ban glasses.
They don't want to be an "app" inside someone else's phone - they want to be the device itself!
Bargaining power is shifting from the hands of those who manufacture the camera to the hands of those who write the code that sees through it.
Manufacturers thought they were adding another nice AI feature to the device.
But they actually invited to dinner the intruder who is trying to take over their home?!