Welcome to 9 to 5 Mac Daily for Friday, September 5th, 2025.

I'm your host, Chance Miller.

We are sponsored this week by Backblaze.

Leading off today, Apple's first iPhone fold is still about a year away from launching,

but according to a new report for Ming Chi Quo, Apple is significantly

raising its expectations for the device. Quo reports that Apple recently revised its shipment

forecast for the foldable iPhone to between 8 and 10 million units in 2026, an increase

from between 6 and 8 million units. For 2027, the company is forecasting between 20 and 25 million units,

a significant increase from the initial estimates of between 10 and 15 million units.

Quo has extensive supply chain sources, so it's very likely that these numbers are accurate,

and if so,

these are huge significant increases. Selling this many units of an all-new iPhone model that's expected to cost upwards of $2,000 would signify a lot of pent-up demand for a foldable iPhone.

Apple has reportedly solved a number of the biggest problems with existing foldables on

the market, like the design, the hinge, and the crease in the display.

So the biggest barrier to entry will indeed be that price point.

But if it's a good enough phone and enough people are interested in foldables, Apple might

have no problem hitting those shipments targets.

In other news today, it looks like META's hiring freeze definitely does not apply to Apple engineers.

Meta had said it was slowing down its hiring and its new Super Intelligent Labs' AI division, but in the meantime, it's

continued to poach executives from Apple. Bloomberg reports that Apple has poached

Jeanne Zeng, Apple's lead AI researcher for robotics. Apple is widely believed to be investing

heavily in robotics technology for future smart display

...