Putting together different technology and building a conherent user experience is where the value is.

The technology alone doesn't mean that much.

It turns out that it matters more to be able to exercise judgement than to be able to create brand new things.

Most really amazing products and inventions are constructed out of technological building blocks that already existed. The Mac, the iPhone, Bitcoin, and many others that I'm forgetting. Existing technology, applied together with judgement about the way it can actually be used by The Rest Of Us, for lack of a better term.

Fun fact: Not one cryptographic primitive in Bitcoin was less than (IIRC) 7 years old when Bitcoin was first released.

Well, at least Apple is not bashing competitor's innovation this time around, as they did with phablets ("nobody would buy something that big"), spen ("over my dead body"), or AMOLE ("awful), that's a progress for Apple.

We probably won't see any foldables from Apple for a long while, but, when they do release one with few cosmetic changes here and there, you are right that their loyal customers would all rise and praise it as a first breakthrough innovation.