The No-Code Advantage · 2026-05-06 · 13 min
Key moments - from our scoring
Substance score
22 / 100
Five dimensions, 20 points each
OpenAI's rumored smartphone partnership with Qualcomm and MediaTek represents a fundamental shift in how users interact with technology. Rather than downloading and launching individual apps, users would communicate directly with a persistent AI agent that handles calendar management, messaging, task automation, payment processing, and search - all through continuous monitoring of location and activity context. Dan Hafner, a no-code app builder and AI director, grapples with the implications of 300 - 400 million annual units replacing traditional iOS and Android phones within five to six years. This threatens not just the App Store's multi-billion-dollar revenue model (which takes 15 - 30% commissions), but the entire no-code economy built around tools like Lovable, Replit, and Base 44. However, Hafner draws parallels to previous technological disruptions: the Industrial Revolution eliminated jobs but created new ones, and he's already seeing AI-driven demand surge for his own services. He identifies critical unresolved questions around data security, personal privacy, password management, and the broader societal impact of outsourcing daily decisions to a single AI intermediary.
OpenAI is reportedly developing a smartphone in partnership with Qualcomm and MediaTek where a persistent AI agent replaces traditional apps. Mass production is targeted for 2027 - 2028 with projected volumes of 300 - 400 million units annually.
Users would speak to the phone and a single AI agent handles everything - calendar, messaging, tasks, search, payments, and ordering - by continuously monitoring location, activity, and context, eliminating the need to open individual apps.
The App Store keeps 15 - 30% of app revenue and pays out 70%, generating multiple billions annually; widespread AI phone adoption would threaten this entire commission-based revenue model.
Hafner argues that AI agents may follow historical patterns where technology eliminates repetitive work but creates higher-level roles (like AI architects and AI directors) that didn't exist before.
Key unresolved issues include data security when continuously sharing personal information, privacy of sensitive conversations, password management, and whether users should trust a single AI intermediary with all daily decisions.
Our reviewer’s read on each dimension, with quotes from the episode.
The episode operates largely at the level of surface-level speculation and rhetorical questions rather than substantive analysis. While the OpenAI phone concept is interesting, Hafner mostly repeats the headline, asks 'what if' questions, and circles back to his own business benefits without delivering novel insights about how AI agents would actually function, the economics of displacement, or specific technical/business model implications. The content is padded with personal asides, self-corrections, and off-topic tangents that reduce insight density.
What if there's no apps in our future?
I mean, there's, this could put even, you're even not only talking about the app store economy, you're talking about this entire vibe coding economy that has been created. What's the need for these tools?
The episode merely echoes the OpenAI report and recycles familiar tech-world tropes: 'the industrial revolution created new jobs,' 'AI will displace but also create roles,' the vague 'SaaS-pocalypse' debate. There is no contrarian argument, no first-principles examination of why agents might or might not replace apps, and no original framework. The thinking is largely reactive to a news story rather than generative.
whether you believe that or not. ⁓ It's also creating jobs that we've never seen before, right?
I think it remains to be seen, but at least we have a couple of years to speculate on
This is a solo host monologue with no guests. The host is a no-code builder and consultant, which gives him some practitioner credibility, but he explicitly disclaims deep expertise ('I'm not Elon Musk, I'm not Sam Altman') and relies on second-hand reporting and speculation rather than direct experience or insider knowledge relevant to AI agents or device strategy.
I'm just a guy that runs a business and builds stuff for myself and builds stuff for my clients and I do this podcast. I'm not Elon Musk, I'm not Sam Altman, I'm not Mark Zuckerberg.
The episode cites one specific number from a report (300 - 400 million units annually by 2027 - 2028) but provides almost no concrete examples, data, metrics, or timelines to ground the speculation. References to 'the app store pays out 15 to 30%' are vague and immediately walked back ('I don't have the exact numbers in front of me'). No specific companies, user behavior studies, or technical details are provided to substantiate claims about AI agent viability.
Mass production of this phone is targeted for 2027, 2028 with projected volumes of 300 to 400 annual million units annually.
I don't have the numbers in front of me.
There is no conversation - this is a solo riff. The host does not challenge his own assumptions, pursue contradictions, or engage with informed counterargument. He largely asks rhetorical 'what if' questions without attempting to answer them rigorously. While he does mention a recent conversation about data privacy ('we got into a conversation about the data of this stuff'), it is not integrated into the episode and serves only as a throwaway observation. The monologue lacks the rigor of true conversational craft.
I encourage you to think about this too. If you're someone that's interested in this and this is intriguing to you like truly sit down for a minute and just think about the ramifications of something like this actually existing, right?
I'm interested to hear your thoughts and your opinions on this.
Computed from the transcript - who did the talking, and the words that came up most.
What happens when AI develops a smartphone that eliminates the need for traditional apps? Imagine a future where your AI agent handles everything - your calendar, messaging, even your banking - just by talking to your phone. According to recent reports, OpenAI is partnering with Qualcomm and MediaTek to produce a device projected to hit 2027-2028, potentially reshaping the entire app economy. This isn’t just speculation; it’s a glimpse into a world where the app store as we know it could become obsolete.
Transcribed and scored by The B2B Podcast Index.
Dan Hafner: Hello everyone. Welcome back to the show. Dan Hafner here. Today I got a very interesting topic I want to come on and talk about, my thoughts and opinions on.
What if there's no apps in our future? What if there's no way that we have the need for them? As someone who builds apps for a living, you can see why I wanted to talk about this. I'm very, very intrigued.
And the reason I want to talk about this is because a story came out. that says OpenAI is ⁓ considering making and building their own ⁓ phone, a phone that basically is the app killer. Why is it the app killer? Let me just read this highlight here.
OpenAI is reportedly developing a smartphone in partnership with Qualcomm and MediaTek where AI agents entirely replace traditional apps. Instead of tapping into apps, a persistent AI agent handles everything, your calendar, your messaging, your tasks, your search, et cetera, by continuously monitoring your location, your activity, and lots of other context. Mass production of this phone is targeted for 2027, 2028 with projected volumes of 300 to 400 annual million units annually.
This is pretty wild. This is pretty wild, guys, because, ⁓ I mean, it makes sense, right? Like, if you connect the dots here, ⁓ it makes sense, one, why they would want to build something like this. And then, two, it just kind of is a logical jump.
If you follow this world very closely, like someone like me, ⁓ it makes sense. That's kind of where everyone has been in this, ⁓ is Sass dead kind of thing. ⁓ which again, I really haven't totally subscribed to, but you know, I also was a very late subscriber to this whole vibe code thing and look how that's turned out for me. You know, I have come out and actually completely said that that's like literally what I do.
⁓ So, you know, is this something that's interesting? You know, this is a ⁓ very big structural threat. I mean, what happens to the app store? What happens to Google Play?
What happens to other app stores that have, you know, I don't even have the numbers in front of me. What ⁓ kind of revenue and numbers that the app store puts out? The only real number they give out is what they pay. you can basically say the app store pays out anywhere between 15 to 30 % of revenues to app developers.
And they pay out billions, like multiple billions, I think, last year. I don't have the exact numbers in front of me. I should look those up. It's large, it's a lot, right?
So if they're keeping, ⁓ or I'm sorry, they keep, they don't pay that out. I had that backwards, I apologize. ⁓ They keep 15 to 30%, so they're paying out 70 % of that. Okay, sorry, my bad, it's been a long day.
My head's kinda hurting, but we're getting through this. So ⁓ that's a lot of money. Like that's a, I mean, Steve Jobs, when they came out with the iPhone and the App Store, created just this economy that has produced God knows how much money since then, right? Is that all gonna go away?
Because all you have to do, you don't even have to click any apps on your phone. You just literally click a button and you talk to something and it goes and does it. You need to order an Uber? You don't need the Uber app anymore.
You wanna order food? You don't need the app anymore. You want to look something up, you don't need Safari or Google or whatever browser you use. You want to lose weight or track your weight, you just talk to the agent.
You just talk to your phone. that's that's insane to me i mean the ramifications of this are the that's kinda wanna come on top and talk about this. ⁓ I mean, there's, this could put even, you're even not only talking about the app store economy, you're talking about this entire vibe coding economy that has been created. What's the need for these tools?
What's the need to create different tools if there's just one large or a subset of agents that you talk to and it just does things for you, right? What about banking? What about managing your money? What about when you get paid or when you like what you have to pay people when how does that work?
You just say, hey, make sure you pay my water bill this month or make sure my mortgage gets paid. I'm sorry that this is a stretch for me. I'm like this is kind of breaking my brain. ⁓ And I encourage you to think about this too.
If you're someone that's interested in this and this is intriguing to you like truly sit down for a minute and just think about the ramifications of something like this actually existing, right? ⁓ There's probably a couple of things that I'm even forgetting about that I'm not even thinking about at the moment, you know? And then that's kind of the nature of these kinds of, you know, it's been the debate for a while of ⁓ is AI a net good for society, right? Even though it's supposedly, the reports vary on this taking away a bunch of jobs, whether you believe that or not.
⁓ It's also creating jobs that we've never seen before, right? We just got hired on as an AI architect, right? I'm a AI director for a special, a growing AI company, right? That job didn't exist three years ago.
It was not a thing. Probably even five, even two years ago. But in the midst of, you know, all of these things that it can create, it going to fully destroy these things? Right?
Like, again, I have yet to see the SaaS-pocalypse that all these people have talked about. I have people every single day. I've never had more leads in my business, never had more clients, never had more revenue, never had more work to do than I have had the last six months because of the explosion of this vibe coding industry, right? It's just the truth.
I just literally got off the phone with somebody ⁓ that had gone down the route of building something, didn't realize how hard it was, need some help. It's exactly what I do, right? Whether it's rebuilding it, getting it unstuck, getting it launched. ⁓ I thought I could launch to the app store.
Now I can't. Maybe you don't even need to because this phone's coming out. Like, I don't know. It's kind of a crazy...
a crazy thing that I'm thinking about. I mean, okay, so if they're going to they said 300 to 400 million units annually. Okay, that's, I mean, that gives, that replaces, you know, an iPhone or an Android phone of everyone within like five or six years, mathematically speaking, right? I don't know, maybe my math's off on that.
I was never a good math. I was never a good math student. yeah, mean, if you are someone that's building apps, if you're someone that's thinking about building an app, or if you're someone that's, you know, paying attention to this, this is a story kind of worth mulling over a little bit. You know, this is kind of why I wanted to come on here and talk about this.
I'm very interested in your guys' thoughts. you know, if you have any comments to leave on this, you know, you know, leave it on our YouTube video. You can also go over to our techbytes.riverside.
com website. can subscribe and can leave comments there. I'm interested what you think. this a feasible thing?
this something that's... Again, I tend to think that technology when it advances, sure, like the industrial revolution definitely put ⁓ people out of jobs, but it also created new jobs. And I think AI is kind of doing the same thing. Like, sure, can...
take away the need for some ⁓ automatic, repetitive kind of work and jobs, but then it frees you up to do other things. It frees up other jobs and other different ⁓ things that are just, I don't wanna say better, but just higher level or just different, right? And that's interesting to think about. That's just an interesting direction to be heading ⁓ for all of us, really.
⁓ So yeah, mean, what does this mean? I think it remains to be seen, but at least we have a couple of years to speculate on, well, maybe a year and a half or so to speculate on this and see if it actually comes into fruition. ⁓ Don't get me wrong. A phone that just you can talk to and it has no need for apps and you can just talk to it does, that sounds really freaking cool.
I was actually just talking with a gentleman this morning as well. We got into a... know, conversation about the data of this stuff. That also gives me pause to think about, okay, what happens with the data, the storage of this, the capture of this data?
I mean, if I'm talking very personal, very private things to this phone, ⁓ is that, you know, is that secure? Is that something that, you do ⁓ I even need to do I even need to remember passwords anymore? You know what I mean? Like there's just, there's so many things I'm like, and I just thought of those, know, we're 10 minutes into this podcast and I didn't even think about that to begin the show, you know?
Yeah, there's just a lot of things that ⁓ come up with that. It just really give me pause. mean, you know, we're all over the place when it comes to, is AI gonna take over the world? Is it gonna destroy humanity?
Is it gonna do all this different stuff? I've never really been a subscriber to that kind of thinking and that kind of logic, but I'm also not a big fish in this. I'm just a guy that runs a business and builds stuff for myself and builds stuff for my clients and I do this podcast. I'm not Elon Musk, I'm not Sam Altman, I'm not Mark Zuckerberg.
I'm not somebody, big fish in this world that is building these tools and building these massive, massive companies. I'm just like you, right? So do I know anything as far as where this is gonna go? probably not any more than you.
just pay attention to news articles, I pay attention to the trends of things, and I form opinions on it because I do research and I have AI give me research and that's kind of where this came up to me and it brought this up as like, story number one, you should talk about this on the podcast. And I was like, ooh, yeah, that's a good one to talk about. That is a good one to talk about, so. All right guys, well, I'm interested to hear your thoughts and your opinions on this.
Leave a comment if you're watching on YouTube or again, like I said, subscribe on the podcast and you can leave a comment there. I'm interested to hear your thoughts and your opinions on this. ⁓ And if you are, like I mentioned as well, if you are someone that's been building an app, you need some help with some things, not really sure what's going on with the AI generated code that you have inside of Lovable or Replit or Base 44 or whatever it is. We do offer a service where we can audit those kinds of apps.
So you can head over to dappernocode.com. You can fill out the form, get in contact with me directly, and I will jump on the phone with you. We'll jump on a Zoom call, and we'll go through your app, and we can do what's called an app audit, and we'll go through.
It's very cheap, very affordable, very fast, and we'll give you your recommendations. Whether you want to work with us in the future, you want to take those recommendations and implement them yourselves, whatever you want to do. So head over to dappernocode.com, fill out the contact form.
And we'd love to help you and take a look at what you got going on. All right, guys, think about this one. Very interesting ⁓ story. yeah, we'll talk to you guys next time.
See you.
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