Samsung, Google, and Qualcomm think they’ve figured out where mobile AI is truly headed

In the wake of the launch of Samsung’s Galaxy Z Fold7, Galaxy Z Flip7 (with its FE variant), and the Galaxy Watch8 series, Samsung shared its thoughts on artificial intelligence and where it’s headed in the hands of consumers who demand more.

At a separate fireside panel during Galaxy Unpacked 2025 (New York), Samsung shared the stage with Google and Qualcomm to talk about the future of Ambient Intelligence. It’s a fancy marketing name, but it adequately captures how these brands perceive consumer-facing AI as its users begin to wear out from AI fatigue.

The panel hosted:

• Jisun Park, Corporate Executive Vice President and Head of Language AI Team, Mobile eXperience (MX) Business at Samsung Electronics
• Mindy Brooks, Vice President of Android Consumer Product and Experience at Google
• Dr. Vinesh Sukumar, Vice President of Product Management at Qualcomm Technologies

Here are some of the more illuminating talking points beyond the usual spiel about respecting user privacy and creating even more AI features for the masses:

Multimodality rethinks what “help” from AI looks like

An overarching thought that permeated all three brands is that AI multimodality (the ability to understand datapoints from text, vision, voice, and more) changes not only user expectations of AI, but also how it’s delivered — and the emphasis is on AI being as invisible as possible.

“We’re building a future where your devices don’t just respond — they become smarter to anticipate, see and work quietly in the background to make life feel a little more effortless,” said Jisun Park. He was referring to Samsung’s AI studies and findings, which revealed that 60% of users want the phone to anticipate needs without being prompted, and AI experiences that are actually personalised to their specific daily hurdles and are more proactive.

“It’s all those little tasks you have throughout the day that take up time and space (managing notifications, your groceries, filling out long forms). All these things add up to a “digital laundry” that takes up space. The power of AI to help with such “digital laundry” allows users to spend time on what they want to spend time on. AI has to be truly assistive in what we provide them (users),” said Mindy Brooks, citing how AI features shouldn’t begin and end at fancy and cute little gimmicks that don’t actually help users.

AI has to go beyond phones to be helpful

Another significant hint is how AI is now perceived in a “post-smartphone” era, where users are looking at how AI can assist them beyond phones.

“By end-2025, we’re committed to getting Galaxy AI into 400 million devices (up from the last recorded 200 million). We have many users comfortable (with AI), starting with the smartphone at the centre. With partners like Google (and Qualcomm), we are involving parts of intelligence to work fluently across all form factors,” said Jisun Park.

Aside from the numbers flexing, both Google and Qualcomm also agreed that the integration of AI needs to seem seamless — like second nature to some — in order to not feel like AI is working in the background yet still provide the help users need. One example given by Google was how its close collaboration with Samsung on many Galaxy AI features allow Gemini to work with first-party Samsung apps and offer personalised responses.

Privacy, a well-flogged dead horse but an important one

User privacy is inevitably brought up at every single AI panel we’ve come across so far, but we are now hearing a different take on how privacy is treated in a world where AI can just take information and run with it.

“It’s an absolute must,” said Dr. Vinesh Sukumar. “User data is highly critical to (AI) personalisation. Personalisation and the use of privacy don’t compete with each other; they go hand-in-hand. We must ensure that we respect the user’s boundaries and provide transparency with our partners to continue creating features that are original.