Should Apple buy its own search engine?

Some people bake bread during a pandemic. Others up their revolutions on the Peloton. Tech analysts at Bernstein, the research-focused brokerage, apparently sit around thinking deep thoughts about the future of mega-cap tech companies.

A troika of analysts unveiled a new report about a trio of tech giants—Google, Apple, and Microsoft—that asks a compelling question: Should Apple buy its own search engine?

The logic is compelling, convoluted, and potentially expensive. Here’s the short version: Google currently pays Apple in the neighborhood of $8 billion annually to be the default search engine on iPhones and other Apple devices. The Bernstein analysts