Apple will lean on Google to help finish its bungled attempts to smarten up its virtual assistant Siri and bring other artificial intelligence features to the iPhone as the trendsetting company plays catch up in technology's latest craze. The deal that allowing Apple to tap into Google's AI technology was disclosed Monday in a joint statement from the Silicon Valley powerhouses. The partnership will draw upon Google's Gemini technology to customize a suite of AI features dubbed "Apple Intelligence" on the iPhone and other products. Apple announced plans to use AI to turn Siri into a more conversational and versatile multitasker in 2024, but that promise remains unfulfilled.

Google's digital ad sales continued to grow at a healthy clip during the holiday season, but that wasn't enough to offset investors' worries about whether its big bet on artificial intelligence will be as lucrative as once envisioned. The October-December results released Tuesday by Google parent Alphabet Inc. showed the company is continuing to reap even more profits from its dominant search engine and other peripheral services. Alphabet's profit climbed 28% from the previous year to $26.5 billion to eclipse analyst projections, but revenue fell slightly below forecasts. More importantly, revenue growth in the Google Cloud division tethered to the AI craze wasn't as robust as had been anticipated.