Apple's foldable finally lands. At $1,999, it needs to.

The iPhone Duo starts at $1,999, roughly the price of two entry iPhones, and it is the first product to carry new CEO John Ternus's name after Tim Cook's exit this month. Apple's shares added about $570bn in value over the summer on the promise of this launch, which means the bar for what counts as success is now uncomfortably high. The company is treating the Duo as a margin play rather than a volume play, a halo device that pushes hinge and display technology down into future models rather than a mass-market replacement for the slab iPhone. Samsung has sold book-style foldables for six years without cracking the mainstream. Apple's bet is that its retail footprint and software polish can do what Samsung's hardware alone could not. If early sell-through disappoints, the market has already told you how much patience it has left for Ternus.