[ehsankia]

Siri is an exclusive feature of iPhones, that's how it's "monetized". This is unlike GA which is available on iOS [0]. So unless this search engine is exclusive to iPhone users as a way of "keeping their privacy intact", I don't see how they can justify running a free search engine for everyone.

[0] https://apps.apple.com/ca/app/google-assistant/id1220976145

[snowwrestler]

Yeah, I think if Apple launches their own search engine, it will take the form of a change that results in Apple handling more searches from Apple devices themselves.

Kind of like Apple Maps, which "competes" with Google Maps but only on Apple devices. You can't just point any web browser at an Apple Maps website the way you can with Google Maps. I doubt that Apple would launch a search engine that you can just browse to from anywhere like Google or Bing.