I'm not sure which part of these spells "Apple’s apparent inaction" in AI field stated in the article?
[1] https://sg.finance.yahoo.com/news/exclusive-apple-ups-hiring...
[2] http://iphone.appleinsider.com/articles/15/09/07/apple-finds...
[3] https://jobs.apple.com/us/search?#specs&ss=machine%20learnin...
Culture is a powerful force in shaping products. For better and worse, Google/Facebook have the "let's use customer data to build products" DNA ingrained into their company DNA. Of course, this has pros and cons. At times, their thirst for customer data can be creepy/controversial while Apple's steadfast support for customer data privacy is assuring.
Ultimately, it comes down to this: How willing are we to exchange our own behavior and demographic data for convenience? If the answer is yes, then the future is as Marco predicts it.
What does Google have? I don't care about search results, they never work automatically, they don't work in a voice only environment.
If you disagree, search Google for "what happened to dinosaurs".
My first insctinct when reading this article, though, is to question wether we put too much faith in the success of any service launched by Google and downplay any other competitor. Weirdly absent from Marco's list is IBM's Watson, quite a success story from a company that does not collect personal information on a daily basis yet somehow has been able to advance significally in the field of AI and Machine Learning.
Aside from that, maybe its me but I don't feel like Siri is so far behind serevices like Alexa or Cortana and until Google Assistant shows up in a more defined state, I wouldnt dare to put it ahead of the pack as well. There are a couple of things Alexa does better, but it mostly has to do with being open to third party services (which im assuming Siri will have soon) and better mic technology on the Echo, a hardware problem.