San Francisco, Nov 3 (IANS): Essentially a hardware-focused firm, Apple is falling behind in the Artificial Intelligence (AI) race with Google and Amazon racing ahead while embracing the open-source and collaborative approach in the emerging field of AI, Fortune reported.

According to Mohanbir Sawhney, McCormick Foundation professor of technology at the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University, sheets of glass are simply no longer the most fertile ground for innovation.

"That means Apple urgently needs to shift its focus and investment to AI-driven technologies, as part of a broader effort to create the kind of ecosystem Amazon and Google are building quickly," Sawhney wrote in Fortune.

According to him, Apple has reached its peak with "super premium" iPhone X and "does not represent the beginning of the next 10 years of the smartphone, as Apple claims".

Apple launched the iPhone X globally on Friday.

Players pursue innovation along a vector of differentiation until the vector runs out of steam.

"When that happens, the focus of innovation shifts to a different vector and new market leaders emerge. We have seen this pattern several times in mobile phone innovation over the past three decades," Sawhney said.

The vector of differentiation is now shifting from hardware to AI and AI-based software and agents.

"As AI-driven phones like Google's Pixel 2 and virtual agents like Amazon Echo proliferateaToday's smartphones will likely recede into the background," he stressed.

Google Pixel phones offers great photo-enhancement features and deeper hardware-software integration driven by AI-based technology.

The second edition of Pixel features 5-inch display, 4GB RAM, 12MP rear and 8MP front camera, and 2,700mAH battery.

Google will bring Pixel 2 XL (6-inch display) into the Indian market from November 15 onwards.

The Amazon Echo enables natural conversations through the Alexa virtual agent.

"Apple has only to look at Motorola, Nokia, and Blackberry to understand how quickly a leader can fall from the peak in this market, and do its best to avert this outcome," Sawhney added.