Barclays Capital’s Ben Reitzes this morning offered up his thoughts on what to expect from Apple‘s (AAPL) Worldwide Developer Conference taking place next Monday morning in San Francisco.
In short, “We are expecting some significant new information to be released regarding new products and further developments around the Apple Ecosystem � the �glue� that sustains its momentum in our view.”
Reitzes thinks discussion by the company of innovations to its “Mac OS X” operating system, specifically the forthcoming “Mountain Lion” release, and the next version of its mobile operating system, “iOS 6,” will be important because “We believe Apple is very serious about getting far in front of [Microsoft's (MSFT)]�Windows 8 and Ultrabooks, leveraging the strength of the iOS franchise.” Ultrabooks are the specification for lighter, thinner notebook computers that�Intel�(INTC) has been promoting with its hardware partners.
Reitzes sees discussion about updated MacBook laptops offering greater NAND flash drive options and “more attractive pricing” that he thinks could spur greater sales growth. He’s looking forward to greater integration of social networking (Facebook (FB) integration has been rumored for the last week or so, as MacRumors’s Eric Slivka has related), and sharing of pictures on social networks could “serve as a much easier option for iCloud users to post photos online” than the MobileMe service that Apple is winding down.
In fact, iCloud should be more deeply integrated into the OS going forward, he’s hoping:
We expect Apple to show deeper native integration of iCloud into Mountain Lion and iOS 6. We believe that iCloud integration across Macs, iOS devices and Apple TV will be a major driver of customer loyalty to the Apple ecosystem in the future as customers will be able to seamlessly access both media content and personal files across devices. W
Apple shares today are down $3.57, or 0.6%, at $560.72.
Update: Wedge Partners‘s Brian Blair was also among those offering a preview today. In a note to clients he wrote that WWDC could be a “catalyst” for the shares, after his having been “on the sidelines” with the stock since mid-April’s FYQ2 report.
New MacBooks would seem to him to be the most important potential development, but he doesn’t see much of a change in the current rate of MacBook growth, given that the iPad means “we are truly in the ‘Post-PC era,’” as late Apple founder Steve Jobs declared, and so people don’t really care as much about notebook computers:
We’ve held the view for some time that newly designed MacBooks would be the big announcement out of WWDC. �Our expectation for the new MacBooks is for a slimmer, MacBook Air-like body, and a higher resolution screen akin to the retina display found on the iPad and iPhone. �We don’t believe Apple will chase Ultrabook pricing downstream and go below $999 on the MacBook Air as some expect, but will instead seek to differentiate its newest offerings with high-resolution screens and OS enhancements, as well as sleeker/lighter casing. �While important to Apple, the Mac category has seen relatively anemic growth the last few years, with Mac units tracking between 3.7 � 5.2 million units per quarter over the 7 quarters (a small range, though we would note that the growth has outperformed the broader PC industry’s growth). �New Mac form factors could positively impact units to a small degree, but we don’t expect to see anything next week that causes a surge in Mac units beyond the slight, steady growth path we have seen.�
As for an “iPad Mini,” it won’t happen this year, he predicts:
Since shortly after the original iPad came out, there has been chatter of a smaller, iPad mini in the works. �Some believe we will see such an announcement next week (some think in the Fall). �The iPad Mini�speculation reminds us of the iPhone Nano chatter that was rampant for the first couple of years that the iPhone was on the market. We do believe Apple has tested a small form factor iPad, but we don�t see one coming to market this year [...] If they DID do a 7 inch screen, we believe it would likely be for an iPod Touch, but that seems like it would just annoy developers. �It seems like 5 screens is all we need: a 4 inch (smartphone), a 10 inch (tablet),� a 15 inch (laptop), a 22 inch (desktop), and a 46 inch (TV). �
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