Apple buys Israeli start-up Q.AI for close to $2bn in race to build AI devices

https://archive.ph/2026.01.29-212308/https://www.ft.com/content/49f4e2e4-3a68-4842-be67-879409d06aa1

Apple has acquired a secretive Israeli start-up Q.AI whose technology can analyse facial expressions to understand “silent speech”, in one of the iPhone maker’s biggest ever acquisitions. 

The deal is designed to help the iPhone maker narrow its gap with Meta, Google and OpenAI in the growing race to create new kinds of wearable devices to speak to AI. 

The deal valued four-year-old Q.AI at close to $2bn, according to people familiar with the terms. In a blog post, one of Q.AI’s financial backers, GV — formerly Google Ventures — said that the deal marked Apple’s “second-largest acquisition in its history.”Patents filed by Q.AI show its technology being used in headphones or glasses, using “facial skin micro movements” to communicate without talking.