Avi Greengart

Continuing my pink mid-tier smartphone unboxings this week with @apple's iPhone 17e in Soft Pink. At $600 for 256GB with the latest A19 Apple Silicon, more durable glass, and MagSafe charging, this is a good value for people who "just need an iPhone." It's fast, build quality is superb, the camera is fine, and it will have software support for years. That said, the iPhone 17e shouldn't cannibalize the iPhone 17 or 17 Pro. It's pretty easy to justify spending another $200 on the regular iPhone 17 to get the better display, better selfie camera, extra rear camera, and lose the notch. That's especially true in countries like the U.S. where carrier subsidies make the price difference negligible.

This isn’t launch volume that will drop off once early adopter demand has been filled, it’s a new market segment for Mac.

Was the @SamsungMobile Galaxy Z TriFold too successful for its own good? I updated my report on the definitely pricey, definitely sold-out, and likely unprofitable Galaxy Z TriFold: techsponential.com/reports/galaxy…

.@ATT has a new app called, "AT&T." Not exactly imaginative branding, but it gets AT&T closer to competing with T-Mobile, which has been aggressively pushing customers to use T-Life to manage service, buy phones, and even switch from rivals. T-Mobile's own employees use a version of the app for most customer service account actions, too. AT&T's app isn't designed to pull subscribers from rivals, but it does try to encourage self-service for device purchases, service plan changes, and cross-sell broadband. Of course there's AI: an AI assistant in the app for support questions. You might as well engage with the AI bot inside the app rather than talking to one on the phone before shouting "representative!" In all seriousness, for many common issues, this could be more straightforward than dealing with call centers.

@ATT has a new app called, "AT&T." Not exactly imaginative branding, but it gets AT&T closer to competing with T-Mobile, which has been aggressively pushing customers to use T-Life to manage service, buy phones, and even switch from rivals. T-Mobile's own employees use a version of the app for most customer service account actions, too. AT&T's app isn't designed to pull subscribers from rivals, but it does try to encourage self-service for device purchases, service plan changes, and cross-sell broadband. Of course there's AI: an AI assistant in the app for support questions. You might as well engage with the AI bot inside the app rather than talking to one on the phone before shouting "representative!" In all seriousness, for many common issues, this could be more straightforward than dealing with call centers.

Sometimes your laptop workstation is a little too, er, robust, and you want something slim. OK, not slim, per se, but thinner and nearly 1.5 lbs lighter. Alongside the @lenovo ThinkPad P16, I'm also testing the ThinkPad P16s which trades off some TDP for better portability.

I'm not at GTC, but I am testing a @lenovo ThinkPad P16 gen 3 with an @nvidia RTX PRO 5000 Blackwell GPU that is posting the highest Geekbench Open CL numbers I've ever seen on a laptop. (OK, this is more of a desktop that folds in half for transport, but it's only 5.7 lbs.)

The new Apple history from @Pogue is on the pricey side but it's HUGE and full of colors pics and illustrations. Excited to add this to Techsponential's corporate library.

@BenBajarin By durability, do you mean that investors are asking for proof that people are willing to pay for AI workloads/agents/tokens above the cost of building the datacenters to do the work?

Talking to a lot of the buy side, it's clear that, despite understanding the constraints and the demand, the central debate is still the durability of the cycle across the board. It is ok to be bullish, but being sensitive to the concerns is wise as well.

@RogerEntner Congratulations, @RogerEntner & Recon!

🚨 Big news: Recon Analytics just made its first acquisition, and it changes the game for telecom and device analytics. Here's why this matters more than most people realize. 🧵

@GooglePixel_US I wrote about why @madebygoogle built the Pixel 10a when it's not all that different from the Pixel 9a here: techsponential.com/reports/pixel1…

Unboxing the @GooglePixel_US 10a today in a stunning Berry colorway. Love the clean design of the hardware and Google's own software user interface.

@Shimmi2020lb Still working on a wrap-up report, should be up this week (got sidetracked by an entire Apple Store that showed up for review)

@greengart Sounds like an amazing experience! 😄🤖 Which AI gadget or innovation from #MWC2026 impressed you the most? 📱✨

Goodbye BCN & #mwc2026! Thanks for all the AI phones, AI robots, AI wearables, network AI (6G!), and Android pins. Great seeing so many friends and clients; trade shows remain an essential way to learn and deliver value 1:1.

This is very, very cool.

@mweinbach @caro_milanesi I was walking out and ended up in a quick chat with Joz

@caro_milanesi @greengart I missed Avi in the pics!

FRANKKK (and Joz and John and Tim)

@tim_cook @aliciakeys @Apple @aliciakeys sings New Yooooork! to close out and thanks “my friend, @tim_cook!”) /end

@tim_cook @aliciakeys @Apple Sign language interpreter is putting on a SHOW #apple50

Apple is marking its 50th birthday with a celebration in NYC. I think I got the cufflinks right.

@RobbieBSosa With credit, yes. Avi Greengart, Techsponential

@greengart Hi Avi - CBS New York here. May we use your photos on all our platforms with a credit?! Thanks so much! Great story!