Tech Week: iPhone Duo Forecasts, AI Cost Hurdles, and Regulatory Scrutiny
Apple's foldable iPhone Duo is in buyers' hands, and one analyst expects 20 million sales in fiscal 2027. Amazon's Andy Jassy says AI inference is still too expensive, and a Tesla-SpaceX merger faces antitrust scrutiny.
Newsnibs Staff
- 2026-10-26
- Updated 8:24 AM UTC
Apple's first foldable phone, the iPhone Duo, is now with buyers who pre-ordered it on October 16, and one analyst expects it to sell 20 million units in Apple's 2027 fiscal year. Apple has warned of limited inventory and long online wait times. The phone starts at $2,000 for 256GB and goes up to $3,200 for 2TB. The entry model costs $700 more than the base iPhone 18 Pro Max.
Gene Munster of Deepwater Asset Management projects the Duo could add $8 billion to Apple's revenue. By his estimate, that would be enough to raise Wall Street's growth expectations for the company from 10% to 13%.
Samsung's foldables sell for less. The Galaxy Z Fold8 costs $300 less than the Duo at its discounted price and is smaller, at 9.7mm thick and 201 grams against the Duo's 11.3mm and 254 grams. Battery capacity is close, 4,800mAh for the Fold8 and 4,883mAh for the Duo, and neither phone has a dedicated telephoto camera. Samsung's Galaxy Z Fold8 Ultra is thinner and lighter than the Duo, with an 8.0-inch inner display and a telephoto lens. Last year's Galaxy Z Fold7 now sells for about $1,300. Motorola's Razr Fold, priced to compete with the Fold8 Ultra, has a 6,000mAh battery and 80W wired charging.
Apple has published guidelines for developers building apps around the Duo's hinge, which holds any angle between 15 and 145 degrees. Some early apps use the fold directly. The free Delta Game Emulator turns the phone into a working Nintendo DS. Orisuji, a $4.99 maze game, makes players fold the phone to guide an origami figure. Fold Accordion, at $2.99, plays music as the hinge opens and closes.
Apple also refreshed the Apple TV 4K. The fourth-generation model runs on the A19 chip and costs twice what the third generation cost at launch.
Amazon CEO Andy Jassy said in an interview with a16z that running AI models, known as inference, is still "approximately 10 times too expensive" for broad enterprise adoption. He said Amazon's in-house chips may help bring that cost down.
Seaport Research Partners analyst Jay Goldberg estimates that only 30 of the 55 gigawatts of AI data center capacity announced for 2027 will be finished. That would be a 45% shortfall, and he says it could weaken future demand for Nvidia's chips.
A possible merger of Tesla and SpaceX faces regulatory scrutiny. A former Justice Department official told Semafor that antitrust regulators might challenge the deal on grounds of "vertical foreclosure," meaning the combined company could limit rivals' access to Starlink technology.
Meta Platforms reported third-quarter results on Wednesday that beat analyst expectations, with revenue of $64.6 billion and adjusted earnings of $7.40 per share.
Photo by Evgeny Opanasenko on Unsplash
