Does the iPhone 7 Fly Like a Drone? No

By Douglas A. McIntyre Updated Jan 13, 3:54AM EST · Published Sep 6, 8:35AM EDT

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Does the iPhone 7 Fly Like a Drone? No — © Thinkstock

It has to be more than a phone. It has to stretch the iPhone universe so widely that it is unimaginable. The iPhone has to fly like a drone, or drive a car without drivers. It has to tell the future. But it won’t do any of these things. Apple Inc.’s (NASDAQ: AAPL) stock will sell off sharply when the iPhone 7 is released. It won’t be the product advance consumers have come to expect.

According to Apple Insider, the iPhone 7 will have a number of advances:

The tidbits come from well-connected analyst Ming-Chi Kuo of KGI Securities, who issued a new research note on Saturday, a copy of which was obtained by AppleInsider. According to Kuo, the so-called “iPhone 7” will come in storage capacities of 32, 128, and 256 gigabytes, eliminating both the 16- and 64-gigabyte tiers for higher storage options.

Kuo also said the camera flash on the new handset will be upgraded, increasing the number of LEDs from two to four. Two of the flash LEDs will be in cool colors, and two will be in warm colors.

Apple is also expected to add an ambient light sensor that will improve image quality, particularly in low-light situations.

Kuo also said the “iPhone 7” will feature the same True Tone-branded display technology the company unveiled earlier this year on the 9.7-inch iPad Pro. The screen is expected to better demonstrate pictures taken with the device’s camera, especially on the 5.5-inch model, which is believed to exclusively boast a dual-camera design.

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A fairly mundane set of new features.

It may also have more RAM, and an option to use it without a wired headset.

The most important speculation about the iPhone 7 is whether iPhone 6 people will upgrade. If they do, consumers will need to get a wireless phone plan, probably for two years, made more expensive because every new iPhone generation gives the wireless carriers reason to do so.

But it does not seem the iPhone 7 will have enough juice for a lot of people to do that, to pay a lot more and extend the contract for such long time. People have seen this trick too many times before. Apple faces mediocre holidays, or worse, and the accusation that it can do less than evolve, and the inevitable drop in share price that will be substantial.

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About the Author Douglas A. McIntyre →

Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.

McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.

His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.

TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.

McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.