While foldable smartphones like the Galaxy Fold have become the norm, large devices with flexible displays have yet to gain much traction, although there are a growing number of such offerings on the market. One of the most anticipated such devices is Apple's MacBook and iPad hybrid, but the company may be overtaken by an unexpected competitor.
According to analyst Ming-Chi Kuo, Amazon is developing a device that will be similar to Apple's upcoming product. Moreover, Amazon may release it to the market earlier - if development goes according to plan, mass production will begin in late 2026 or 2027.
According to Kuo, mass production of Apple's 18.8-inch flexible device on macOS will begin only in late 2027 or 2028. In addition, Apple is already lagging behind Chinese companies such as Huawei, which the day before introduced its first laptop with a flexible screen on HarmonyOS – the MateBook Fold.
Other major manufacturers are also producing similar laptops. Over the past few years, ASUS, Lenovo, HP, and other companies have introduced models with flexible displays, but such devices have not yet gained widespread acceptance in the market.
Meanwhile, Amazon's ambitions for flexible devices remain vague. While the company doesn't have a great reputation for hardware, that could change soon. After joining Amazon about two years ago, former Microsoft Surface head Panos Panay announced plans to completely reevaluate the company's hardware direction and make its devices more premium.
In his statement, Panos Panay was primarily referring to the Alexa line of devices, but the current head of Amazon's devices and services division also has experience working on laptops and tablets - so it is quite likely that this experience will be used to create a flexible device. In addition, Panay was the head of the devices division at Microsoft during the period when the company was working on the foldable Surface Neo.