Apple's new chief executive opened his tenure with a $2,000 foldable iPhone, and Patrick McGee's read is that the company is not counting on selling many of them.
The usual test for a launch like this is whether it becomes the next iPad. McGee's point is that a product can fail that test and still do its job.
"Apple has been so dogged by these reports that it doesn't really innovate anymore that coming out with this product sort of gives a halo to the company, even though I don't think many people are going to buy it."
McGee reported on Apple for the Financial Times and wrote Apple in China, the book on how the company built its manufacturing base inside the country.
I listened to the full segment so you can skip it.
Here are the 5 takeaways that matter.
👤 Guest: Patrick McGee, award-winning journalist and author of Apple in China: The Capture of the World's Greatest Company
🎙️ Host: Ed Elson, who presents Prof G Markets for Prof G Media
📰 Published: 10 September 2026 on YouTube (Prof G Markets)
🔴 YouTube | ⏱️ 9 min
Key Takeaways
He rates the hardware highly and the proposition not at all: he cannot say what the foldable is for
His own setup is an iPad with a keyboard, which he says already does the job the Duo is being sold on
A product that sells badly is not a failure if it repairs Apple's reputation for innovating
The iPhone Air did exactly that last year: weak sales, but it gave the iPhone Pro something to be compared against
A pre-recorded launch video tells you nothing about a new chief executive, which he suspects is the point
Tim Cook's first live keynote after Steve Jobs died is still on YouTube, nerves included; there is no equivalent for John Ternus
Apple is still Tim Cook's company, and McGee expects it to stay that way for years
Cook is staying on to handle New Delhi, Beijing, Brussels and Washington, and the chief operating officer runs the machine
He was going to buy the Duo as a journalist and changed his mind once he saw the price of the storage he needs
Doubling the storage takes it to $2,200, which he says is more than the device is worth to him
1. A $2,000 Foldable
Elson set the scene: John Ternus opened as chief executive with the biggest change to the iPhone in nearly a decade. Apple unveiled a $2,000 foldable called the iPhone Duo, about the size of a passport, with a display 80% larger than the most recent iPhone, alongside the iPhone 18 and 18 Pro, the AirPods 5 and a new Apple Watch series. It was Ternus' first launch since taking over from Tim Cook on September 1st, and Apple shares closed roughly flat.
On the engineering, McGee had no reservations. "I mean, look, I think it's a marvel of industrial engineering and hardware engineering. I mean, it looks fantastic. I've I've been able to talk to some people who have been playing with it today in Cupertino, and they do say it's fantastic."
The question he keeps returning to is the price. "Obviously, the question is, are people going to pay $2,000 for this and I think the two scenarios are either that it underwhelms or that Apple is already sort of baking in that it's not going to have high sales and so it's going to meet low expectations as it were."
The comparison he reached for is the iPad, and it does not flatter the Duo. "You know, the thing I think about is when Steve Jobs introduced the iPad in 2010, he was able to credibly market it as a entirely new product category, saying it's more portable than a desktop, but it's bigger than an iPhone. And that felt intuitive, and they've sold hundreds of millions of them since."
He thinks that is the pitch being attempted, and he is not buying it. "Is the iPhone Duo trying to position itself like that? That's the sense I got from the new CEO, John Ternus. But I'm not really convinced."
His own objection is a use-case one, not a taste one. "I'm someone who has an iPad with a keyboard, and so if I need to get a little bit of work done that's not on the laptop, that's what I'm going to do. If if you if you're in that situation, why would you also have an unfoldable phone? I just don't know what service it serves even though it's cool."
2. Not the Next Category
Elson put the strategic version of the question: is this the generational product Apple watchers have been waiting for, after the Vision Pro, which he described as something of a disaster that Apple does not report properly in its earnings because it is not selling. McGee's answer separated commercial success from strategic value.
He does not think Apple is betting the era on it. "I don't think they are. I mean to be clear I think the 18 Pro the new version of the best iPhone will do just fine and people will buy that. I'm probably going to buy that. So, I mean, for them not to have market hits isn't to say that they're in any way failing."
The precedent he cited is last year's thin iPhone. "You know, the closest sort of precursor we have to this is the iPod, sorry, the iPhone Air last year. Now, it didn't do well in terms of sales, but it sort of allowed them to really push what the iPhone Pro was doing, right?" The Air gave the company a contrast to sell the Pro against. His verdict on it: "And even though it didn't sort of work in terms of sales, I do think it worked in terms of the marketing pitch."
The strategic value is reputational. "Apple has been so dogged by these reports that it doesn't really innovate anymore that coming out with this product sort of gives a halo to the company, even though I don't think many people are going to buy it."
Which is why he refuses to call it a mistake. "So, by saying it's not going to be a big sales hit, isn't to say that it's a mistake to have it in the market."
3. Ternus Gave Nothing Away
Asked how Ternus came across as a communicator and a leader, McGee said the format made that impossible to judge — and then made the case that Apple prefers it that way.
His answer was that nobody learned anything. "I'll be shocked if anybody says they feel like they learned a lot about John Ternus, either as a person or as a communicator, let alone as a leader today. And that's because Apple since co has done away with keynote presentations, live keynote presentations."
The contrast is Cook's own first time. "It was a big deal when Tim Cook had to take over after the passing of Steve Jobs and really do his first keynote. You know, you could tell he was nervous. It's still up there on YouTube if you want to follow. There's nothing like that for John Ternus. Who knows how many takes took place before he sort of nailed it, right? He wasn't talking in front of a live audience other than sort of waving a little bit at the start."
He is careful to say the choice is rational, not cowardly. "So, I get why Apple has these like cinematic experiences, but Steve Jobs never would have tolerated that, right? And to be clear, that that's not necessarily a criticism." The benefits he lists are density of information and de-risking: "They don't have, you know, hundreds of reporters around the world all talking about some flop, right? Some error that took place on stage."
What it costs is the thing that made launches matter. "Like there's all sorts of reasons why it makes sense to have a cinematic thing, but they've just sort of taken the like the oomph out of it, right? You sort of want to have the live demo."
And the comparison he drew from that is with the AI labs. "And it's really interesting that OpenAI does do these live demos, right? They're little sort of little quirkier, but it's almost telling you that like a startup can take those kind of risks in a way that a Goliath cannot."
4. Still Tim Cook's Apple
Elson framed the succession question as a choice between Jobs the visionary and Cook the operator who created more shareholder value than arguably any chief executive in history. McGee rejected both options.
His answer was neither, and the reason is who actually runs the machine. "I kind of think neither. I mean, to be clear, Apple is going to keep the trains running on time. I just don't think it's John Ternus that's going to be making that happen, right? Sabih Khan is the chief operating officer. He's been at the company since the late 1990s." Khan, in his account, came up under Cook and knows what needs doing
The hard problem is the one Cook is keeping. "What's going to be more complicated is if they really do position out of China and grow their capacity in India, right? So far, so far that's more hype than reality in terms of what needs to be done."
Cook has not left the building. "And Tim Cook is basically staying on, right, to be negotiating with New Delhi, Beijing, Brussels, and Washington. And so to a certain extent, I don't think we're going to see John Ternus make his mark, certainly not in the geopolitical scope of things for several years, either until Tim Cook has sort of just moved on a little bit or has officially retired from the company."
He expects the verdict to take years, and says so without apology. "I just think anticlimactically we're actually not really going to know what Ternus' impact is for several years right not a very good sort of media headline answer but it's still Tim Cook's company"
The test he would watch for is a firing. Cook removed Scott Forstall, whom McGee describes as a Jobs protege, about 15 months into his own tenure — a "new sheriff in town approach" — and he does not expect Ternus to have an equivalent moment. What he is watching for is a decision Cook would not have taken, and he doubts the board minutes on any such call will ever be public: "how do you really judge whether it's Ternus' company or not"
5. He Won't Be Buying It
Elson's last question was the simplest one, and it produced a same-day reversal.
Yesterday he would have said yes, for professional reasons. "You know to be honest if we spoke yesterday before the before the product had even come out I would have said yes just as a as a tech journalist, like I want to I want to be, you know, be familiar with how it works and everything, right? And now it's a no."
Seeing it did not change his view of the hardware. He singled out the hinge behavior — the feature that carries your screen over as the device opens, which he said Apple calls continuity: "And it's a really cool feature and it feels like as impressive as the hardware."
The number that decided it is not the sticker price. "I don't want the base model. I need to double the storage. It means I'm buying a $2,200 device. And I just don't think I'm there. I just don't know what purpose it serves in my life."
Elson's own hesitation was physical. He said it looks really nice but too big, and that he was unsure about carrying something that size in a pocket every day
Bonus Insights
Elson's read on the Vision Pro was blunt: "The Vision Pro based on my understanding has been something of a disaster. They don't really report it properly in their earnings I think because it's not doing well." That is the host's claim, not McGee's
The same episode carried a market read in which Brent crude topped $101 a barrel for the first time since May and the 10-year Treasury yield hit its highest level since 2023
This is one of three interviews in the same Prof G Markets episode, which also carried Alex Kantrowitz on the Anthropic extinction warning and Ramp's Ara Kharazian on enterprise AI spending, each written up on its own
McGee's bottom line is that the iPhone Duo is a well-engineered product without an obvious job, which Apple can afford because its value is the reputation for invention rather than the unit sales — and that judging the new chief executive on any of it is premature while Tim Cook is still the one negotiating with four capitals.
Products, Companies & Tools Mentioned
iPhone Duo (The $2,000 foldable, about the size of a passport with a display 80% larger than the last iPhone; McGee calls the hinge behavior as impressive as the hardware and still would not buy one)
Apple (Under a new chief executive since 1 September, though McGee argues the chief operating officer runs operations and Tim Cook still runs the geopolitics)
Apple Vision Pro (Elson's example of the last product that was supposed to be Apple's next era, which he says has not sold)
OpenAI (His contrast for Apple's pre-recorded launches: a startup that still runs live demos, and can take the risk)
Books & Resources Mentioned
Apple in China: The Capture of the World's Greatest Company – Patrick McGee (The book behind his standing on Apple's manufacturing base, and behind the India-versus-China argument in this segment)
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