Benjamin Mayo

Earlier in the week, Apple was hit by a European Commission ruling to the tune of 13 billion euros in back taxes to Ireland. Apple immediately refuted any wrongdoing and has already said the Irish government will appeal. Apple CEO Tim Cook has continued this tirade today in the Irish press, with a newspaper column in the Independent and a rare radio interview (with RTE’s Paschal Sheehy).

Cook does not hold back on his language. He says the 0.005% effective tax rate bandied about by the Commission is false and “total political crap”. He says Apple actually paid $400 million to Ireland in the same year and believes it was the largest taxpayer in the country that year.

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An interesting image is making the rounds today: a photograph of a purported packaging insert for Apple’s upcoming new phone. If the photo is to be believed, Apple will indeed be calling its larger new phone the ‘iPhone 7 Plus’, with the ‘iPhone 7’ name being taken by the 4.7 inch sibling.

It also indicates that Apple will be bundling Lightning EarPods in the box with every iPhone 7, as a consequence of the missing 3.5mm headphone jack. More interestingly, the leak suggests Apple will also be including a Lightning to 3.5mm Headphone Jack adaptor as a bundled accessory.

Full photo of the pamphlet after the jump …

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With the iPhone 7 (or whatever it ends up being called) set to be launched next week, we already know a lot about Apple’s new phone. The iPhone 7 will largely look the same as the iPhone 6s with tweaked antenna lines and new cameras (dual cameras on the larger 5.5 inch phone). It also seems like Apple is preparing to add a new color option to the lineup, a ‘Space Black’ color variant.

A photo from Macotakara suggests that Apple will not be replacing the Space Grey color but instead add a glossy ‘Space Black’ shade as an additional color option. This would mean Apple would sell a total of five different coloured iPhone 7 units.

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Tim Cook has posted an open letter on Apple.com for customers, in response to the European judgement that Ireland must recover 13 billion euros in tax revenue from Apple, covering the period 2003-2014. In the public posting, Cook lambasts the judgement as having serious consequences on European business. It says the ruling suggests Apple received a special deal on our taxes which has “no basis in fact or in law”. Cook says Apple is being compelled to pay back taxes to a government that states Apple does not owe any additional money.

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Apple’s September product unveiling event is now confirmed as being held on September 7 at a keynote in San Francisco. Rumors are expecting a new iPhone 7 to be launched, largely resembling an iPhone 6s with dual cameras as a new flagship feature. Russian trademark filings discovered by mobiltelefon.ru confirm that Apple is readying new iPhones with model numbers A1778 and A1784.

The filings also describe a series of new Apple wearable devices, which appear to be different versions of Apple Watch 2 and maybe tweaked Apple Watch 1 hardware too. Most interestingly, it also confirms the existence of ‘AirPods’ – official wireless headphones to be used in tandem with the iPhone 7 …

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EU antitrust regulators have today ruled that Ireland’s tax arrangements with Apple are illegal. It is demanding that the country get Apple to pay back up to 13 billion euros in back taxes, around 15 billion dollars. Last night, it was reported to be in the region of 1.1 billion dollars so this is a substantial increase in the final ruling. The bill is probably subject to appeals but a ruling in the order of billions is a huge deal, even for Apple.

Update: Apple has said that it will appeal the European Commission tax decision, via Reuters.

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Philips Hue has quickly risen to the top of the food chain as far as iPhone smart home automation is concerned, with a range of HomeKit-compatible white and color lights that are controllable via WiFi. The company is now expanding its Hue range beyond lighting, to include related accessories …. a Motion Sensor. The new Motion Sensor goes on sale in October and allows users to automate parts of their lighting experience based on movement in rooms.

The box is powered by AAA batteries and can be mounted pretty much anywhere in your home. With the Philips app, lights can be triggered based off motion sensor movement and turn off automatically after a set duration. Other intelligent features include a setting to only enable lighting when the room is actually dark, conserving energy usage.

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Very sketchy images have surfaced showing off supposed future iPhone product packaging, raising the potential of Apple calling a new iPhone the iPhone 6 SE. Whether this is meant as a successor to the 4 inch iPhone SE or the ‘real’ name for the iPhone 7, due to be announced early next month, is unclear. An upgrade to the iPhone SE is not expected and has not been rumored, as the device only launched a few months ago.

Update: More photos from Priceraja, including a look at the pamphlet.

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AT&T chairman Randall Stephenson will soon announce that a consortium of 33 companies, including Apple, AT&T, Google and Comcast are joining the FCC in an effort to crack down on phone call spam made by robots, according to Reuters. In the inaugural “Robocall Strike Force” meeting, the companies will announce their initial plans on how to stop US phone owners from receiving advertorial spam run by automated machines …

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The Australian banks have been denied permission to act as a monopolistic cartel in the country, preventing them from negotiating collectively with Apple over Apple Pay terms for the time being as reported by Reuters. Australian banks are resisting adoption of Apple’s mobile payment solution (available in iPhone 6 and iPhone 6s), referring to hefty fees and loss of customer control.

Apple says that the banks are being anti-competitive by blocking the introduction of innovative payment technologies like Apple Pay. The banks want to force Apple to open up the NFC chip to third-party developers, which Apple says would cripple the security standards of its platform.

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With Twitter winning the bid for Thursday night NFL football, the company is keen to get its live streaming content in front of eyeballs. This apparently includes Apple TV, according to a report by the New York Times. Twitter is holding talks with Apple regarding a new app which would enable Apple TV customers to watch NFL live through the Twitter app.

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Apple is going to shake up the iPad lineup in a big way in 2017, according to securities analyst KGI Ming-Chi Kuo. Next year, Apple will reportedly release three new iPads, a 12.9 inch iPad Pro 2, a low cost 9.7 inch iPad and — most interestingly — a new iPad Pro with a 10.5 inch display, a new screen size for Apple’s tablet range. With a diagonal increase of just 0.8 inches over the 9.7 inch iPad, its unclear at this stage what will justify the introduction of another SKU.

Perhaps, the device will stay the same physical shape but feature an edge-to-edge screen, enabling Apple to increase the screen size slightly. An edge-to-edge iPad display would mirror the rumored revolutionary glass redesign currently expected for iPhone 8, which would also debut next year. Further into the future, Kuo also reports that the iPad will follow the iPhone in adopting OLED technology screens starting in 2018 …

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In a continuation of the Fast Company interview from Monday, Apple execs Eddy Cue and Craig Federighi discuss in detail the issues Apple Maps faced when it launched and how the company responded. Interviewed by Rick Tetzeli, Cue explains the problems Apple encountered with Maps: “it just never ends”. Cue says that Maps is an endless task as businesses open and close, POIs and streets change, etcetera. Initially, Apple’s engineering processes did not account for this kind of dynamic activity.

However, Cue says Apple now uses data from customer iPhones to constantly make Maps better. For example, Apple can find out if a new golf course has opened by tracking user App Store downloads. If a burst of iOS users start downloading golfing apps in the same location, Apple can reasonably assume a new POI has been setup.

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Apple has made a formal complaint to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission in response to resistance from Australian financial institutions to adopt Apple Pay. Apple says the country’s three largest banks have formed a monopolistic cartel and are collectively dictating terms of new payment business models, like Apple Pay.

It also rejected the request from banks to let them have access to the NFC radio and create alternate contactless payment systems on top of the iPhone. Apple says doing so would compromise the security of its platform as it mandates very high standards when customers make payments on Apple systems.

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Over the weekend, a few photos appear to show that the iPhone 7 will indeed come in a new Space Black color variant, as previously rumored. The black chassis, SIM tray and mute button we saw earlier pictured are markedly darker than the Space Grey color seen with iPhone 6s. The exact source of these new images is unclear.

The new black color mirrors the Space Black option for Apple Watch. It is unclear if the Space Black iPhone 7 would be released alongside the Space Grey color option, or if it would replace it in the lineup.

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Apple Watch 2 is indeed imminent, according to reliable Apple analyst KGI’s Ming-Chi Kuo. Although there have been a lack of leaks about the upcoming new Watch, KGI says the device will launch in late 2016 (likely announced alongside the iPhone 7 in September) and feature several flagship changes.

The new Apple Watch will include a GPS, barometer, waterproofing beyond what is already touted with Apple Watch 1 as well as a new internal SoC for faster performance. However, KGI does not expect the physical design of the watch to change with this generation.

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Headphone jack not found on iPhone 7 mockups and leaks.

The removal of the 3.5mm analogue headphone jack from the iPhone 7 is well documented at this point. What is less clear is what Apple will offer as a replacement for new iPhone buyers. There have been rumors (and alleged photos) of Lightning EarPods to be bundled in the box … but there has also been rumors of Apple developing Bluetooth headphones too.

A report from Forbes says Apple has been working on an in-house custom designed Bluetooth chip for several years. The Apple Bluetooth component focuses on power efficiency and could enable Apple to debut new wireless headphones with really long battery life, perhaps in concert with the iPhone 7 launch — expected release date is September 16th.

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Apple is adding a lot of new emoji in iOS 10 as well as redesigning the most popular icons to a modern style, as seen in iOS 10 beta 4 which just dropped for developers.

iOS 10 includes over 100 new emoji in total with new female gender options for athletes and professionals, new family characters and redesigns of the most popular emojis. Here’s all the new emoji …

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Apple continues to experiment in the social media space to promote its businesses and products. In this vein, iBooks has launched its own official Instagram account this weekend. Apple is using the photo-centric social network to share book artwork, quotes, min-reviews and more. Interestingly, none of the posts so far feature call-to-action links where users can directly purchase the promoted novels from iBooks itself.

It appears to be using a more subtle marketing approach, raising awareness of books which users can then lookup and buy from the iBookstore if they choose.

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