Samsung's CEO Just Wrote Down Exactly How It Plans to Beat Apple at AI

Two weeks before Galaxy Unpacked, Samsung has done something it rarely does. TM Roh, the company's President and CEO, has personally published an editorial, and it reads less like a product teaser and more like an attempt to change what the entire AI conversation is even about. Titled "AI Doesn't Need To Outthink You. It Needs To Understand You," the piece arrives ahead of the July 22 event in London, and while it never names a single rival, the framing lands as a pointed contrast to how Apple and Google have been selling their own AI so far.

It is not about the smartest AI anymore

According to Roh's core idea, the smartest AI does not automatically win. What matters is how well it fits into your daily life. He points out that electricity changed the world through the switch in your home, not the power plant, and the internet became useful through the browser. AI, he says, is the same. It is now entering an agentic age, where it can act on your behalf while you keep the final call. But it first has to know you to act for you.

This is where Samsung thinks it has an edge. It owns more doors into your day than anyone else. The phone stays closest to you, the watch reads your sleep and heart rate, and the TV and home appliances add context from where you live. Roh gives one clear example, describing how sleep tracked by your watch could shape tomorrow's schedule. Apple has the phone and watch. Google has Android and search. Neither has Samsung's full spread of devices under one roof.

The quiet dig at Apple and Google

The privacy angle is where things get competitive. Roh says Samsung Knox protects not just each device but the connections between them, with sensitive data staying on the device so you keep control. That is a direct answer to the worry around cloud-based AI that has followed both rivals. Apple uses Private Cloud Compute to make a similar promise, and Google keeps facing questions about how much Gemini sends to its servers.

He also talks up openness, pointing to SmartThings as proof that Samsung builds with partners instead of a walled garden. This reads like a subtle jab at Apple's closed ecosystem. Google's Android is open too, but spread thin across dozens of brands. Samsung is pitching itself as the middle path, open enough to grow, controlled enough to stay safe.

Eight foldables against Apple's first

The sharpest point is about timing. When Apple launches its strongly rumoured first foldable in coming months, Samsung will already be on its eighth. Roh nods to this, saying foldables fold into your hand or open a larger stage, and that Samsung has made them thinner, lighter, and stronger over the years. Samsung has confirmed that Unpacked on July 22 will show a new foldable shape, widely expected to be a wider Galaxy Z Fold8. Eight years of practice against a rival's first try is a real edge.

None of this confirms exact features, but that is not the point. Samsung is no longer trying to win on benchmark scores, a fight it was losing to OpenAI and Google. It is changing what winning means, moving the goalposts to ecosystem, trust, and hardware it has spent years perfecting. As Roh puts it, the real question is not who has the smartest AI, but who understands people best.