Siri is not why people are buying iPhones, in fact well over 50% of users say they never or rarely use it. So, your point doesn't really hold up. Siri still loses money, just like Google Assistant and Alexa. The apps you listed to compare with OS bundles have not even close to the same overhead as a digital assistant and can be handled with relatively small programming teams.

Apple is selling HomePods and iPhones for a profit. But Amazon is/was selling Echos for a loss, in the hope that they would drive additional Prime music subscriptions and lower friction to Amazon purchases. That didn’t happen, and so the product line all-devices-sold-with-Alexa has lost Amazon money. The equivalent comparison, all devices with Siri, has made Apple a ton of money.

Without examining internal Amazon or Apple data on the marginal sales increase estimates for Siri/Alexa it's impossible to say, though.

Apple has earned a lot of money on devices with Siri included. Microsoft has made a lot of money on OSes with Minesweeper included.

It would be wrong to conclude anything about the profitability of Minesweeper based on that fact, just as it is wrong to conclude anything about the profitability of Siri based on the equivalent fact from Apple.

Apple's HomePods have been a resounding failure though? I don't know where you're getting your data, but it's wrong. They literally discontinued the original model because sales were SO bad.

Speaking of data, what are you basing that on? They seem to be selling well according to industry reports and companies tend not to continue products which lose money.

They've sold a billion dollars worth of HomePod minis. Even at Apple scale, that's not bad.

They've just launched a new HomePod that replaces the original. It's weird that there was such a big gap between the first one and the new one.

>Siri is not why people are buying iPhones, in fact well over 50% of users say they never or rarely use it

So? A decent portion of users do use it, and for some of them its a vital feature.

I would be shocked if removing siri would save Apple more money than the lost revenue of fewer iphone sales.

I love how everyone is missing the point that the assistants lose money. You can subsidize the loss, but it's still not profitable. People do not buy the iPhone because of Siri, especially given it is the worst of the big 3 assistants.