Apple to sell 37 million iPods this year?
updated 04:05 pm EST, Tue November 1, 2005
37M iPods this year?
Piper Jaffray senior analyst Gene Munster today maintained an "outperform" rating and a $60 price target on Apple Computer, and believes that the company will sell over 37 million iPods by the end of the calendar year. The firm says that Apple's domination in digital music is a "critical piece" to the overall potential of the company, but says it does not believe that the iPod is the only growth avenue. "Indirectly, we expect the iPod to continue to be a foundation for growth in other parts of Apple's business, and we expect that by the end of CY05 more than 37m iPods will have shipped, providing Apple with a greater scope of awareness for various products ("halo" effect). It appears that this phenomenon has begun to take effect, with a record 1.23m Macs shipped in the September quarter.
Apple has two products on Amazon.com's top 10 sellers list of all electronics, four in the top 20, and the number of Macintosh computers increased from seven to eight in Amazon's top 10, setting an all-time high since Munster began tracking the top sellers. There has also been a prompt decrease in shipment time for white and black iPod nanos, a sign that supply constraints are easing, according to Munster. The fifth-generation video-capable iPod is also believed to be partially responsible for the decrease in Nano shipment time.
