Pocketnow Daily: iPhone Sales to FALL if WeChat is Banned? (video)

Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra, Apple’s 27-inch iMac and more devices, on sale today

Deals. Let’s start today with the Galaxy S20 Ultra, which is currently available for $171 off on Amazon, leaving it at $1228 shipped with the US warranty. The 2019 27in iMac is also up to $250 off, meaning you can find the 6-core Intel i5, 8GB of RAM and 1TB of storage variant for $1700 shipped. If you’re interested in the HomePod… for some reason… Best Buy also has it for $100 off, leaving it at $199. We also have more deals on Sennheiser headphones, Jabra Earbuds and more.

Qualcomm reportedly seeks US government’s permission to sell chips to HUAWEI

Last week we talked about how the Mate 40 Series might be the last Huawei phone powered by a Kirin processor and, if you watch that video I speculated about them turning to Qualcomm for SoCs and well…. According to the Wall Street Journal, Qualcomm made a presentation for the US government, to remove restrictions and let them sell Snapdragon chips to Huawei. They’re pitching it by saying how this ban could drive “billions of dollars” to foreign chip makers like Samsung and MediaTek and lifting this ban could help Qualcomm stay competitive. Qualcomm’s goal right now is to sell to every smartphone maker and if a shift in the 5G market share changed, this could be big for them.

We have new leaked renders of the upcoming Microsoft Surface Duo

I think it’s been 10 or 11 months since we’ve been waiting for the Surface Duo… Yeah. Well last week it went through certifications and it looked like we were getting closer to a launch date but, we still don’t have it. Now we have some new leaked renders from Evan Blass showing off the AT&T variant of this device. On these pictures we can see the phone both open and closed, showing off the interface. We also get to see the selfie camera and the pretty big bezels and,  it looks like there’s still no main camera on the outside. There’s also that leaked video which surfaced months ago showing how you can interact with the phone without it being fully open. We’re still expecting this device to launch… sometime soon with the same dated specs.

First public beta for watchOS7 is available for beta testers

You will soon find Google Maps in your Apple Watch

After several developer betas, Apple just seeded the first Public Beta of WatchOS 7 to consumers. The update can be installed pretty much like an iOS beta by downloading the profile and since this is the first release, it might bring some serious bugs. It brings new features like sleep tracking, complications, and more. Speaking of new features, Google just announced several of them for Apple products that are independent of the beta. For example, now you get a fully working Google Maps app for the Apple Watch that works pretty similar to the iPhone app, letting you get walking, biking, public transit and car directions from your wrist. Some destinations need the iPhone to be able to work properly but, it also supports step-by-step and it gives you an ETA. Moving on to CarPlay, there’s a new Dashboard integration for the media app now, the calendar and turn-by-turn directions as well but it is now presented in a split-screen view.

Twitter purportedly expresses interest in acquiring TikTok US operations

TikTok is reportedly suing Trump administration over executive order threatening a ban

Let’s talk about Tik Tok because, it’s actually a pretty big deal right now. If you haven’t been following, the US President basically told them that they had 45 days to sell the US arm of Tik Tok to a US company or they would be banned in the States. Well, since them we’ve seen Microsoft interested in buying and now, it looks like Twitter wants in too. According to Reuters, Microsoft is still the front runner but, Twitter has apparently approached ByteDance to make the acquisition. The problem is that Twitter is worth around $30B which is almost the value of the Tik Tok assets being purchased here so, they would need to raise additional capital to make this deal happen. However, it looks like ByteDance doesn’t want to stay quiet, they will reportedly be filing a federal lawsuit in Southern California for the President’s “far-reaching action which is unconstitutional, based on pure speculation.” We’ll keep you posted to see what ends up happening here but, in the meantime Facebook already launched a copy cat with Instagram Reels because… it’s Facebook.

Story of the day:

iPhone shipments could decline by up to 30% if Apple axes WeChat from App Store: Kuo

And finally, speaking of bans since it seems to be the major topic of discussion today, it looks like Apple will be affected by another ban too. There was recently an executive order, kind of like the one with Tik Tok, to end US transactions with WeChat and Tencent. And by the way, WeChat is like all our social media, chat and payment services baked in one, so for China it’s pretty much everything. Well, according to a new report from Ming Chi Kuo, Apple could suffer a lot from this as WeChat currently has 1.2B monthly users and banning it globally from the App Store would be catastrophic . He laid out different scenarios as to how this might affect iPhone sales, in the best case, shipments would be affected by 3%-6% but, in the worst-case scenario, iPhone shipments globally would decline by 25-30% and this also translates to other products like the Apple Watch, AirPods and even Macs. Kuo is even recommending that investors should reduce their stock holdings of companies in Apple’s Supply Chain due to the risks this WeChat ban. The order will apparently happen on September 20th so, let’s see what happens. Subscribe: http://bit.ly/pocketnowsub http://pocketnow.com Follow us: http://flipboard.com/@Pocketnow http://facebook.com/pocketnow http://twitter.com/pocketnow http://google.com/+pocketnow

The post Pocketnow Daily: iPhone Sales to FALL if WeChat is Banned? (video) appeared first on Pocketnow.

Apple reportedly shipped 29 million iPhone X units in Q4 2017, ‘slightly below expectations’

According to Canalys market research, Apple's iPhone X was the world's top-shipping smartphone during the October - December 2017 quarter, selling particularly well in China.

The post Apple reportedly shipped 29 million iPhone X units in Q4 2017, ‘slightly below expectations’ appeared first on Pocketnow.

iPhone X shipment forecasts getting bleaker, 2018 models expected to sell like crazy

It's not looking good for Apple's iPhone X, which may end up selling just 18 million units in Q1 2018, and 12 mil in Q2. But its three sequels should do great business.

The post iPhone X shipment forecasts getting bleaker, 2018 models expected to sell like crazy appeared first on Pocketnow.

iPhone X could help Apple break shipment and average selling price records this quarter

Apple is in record-breaking form this year-end quarter, according to IHS Markit research, as the lucrative iPhone X continues to sell like hotcakes.

The post iPhone X could help Apple break shipment and average selling price records this quarter appeared first on Pocketnow.

Apple reports strong Q3 revenue growth on steady iPhones, surging iPads, record services

Total Apple revenue was on the rise this past quarter compared to last year, and it's all thanks to "services." And iPads. And of course, iPhones.

The post Apple reports strong Q3 revenue growth on steady iPhones, surging iPads, record services appeared first on Pocketnow.