To be fair, the iPhone 15 line came out before Apple Intelligence was even announced.

It's the iPhone 16 line that feels a bit shitty not getting the latest and greatest since it was advertised as "built for Apple Intelligence"

Apparently the 17 Pro is the only currently released iPhone that will get the best local model. Which I suppose makes sense considering it has 12GB of RAM compared to the 16 Pro's 8GB.