Analyst: Apple to continue to expand beyond ‘Mac core’
Posted by Dennis Sellers 
Dec 21, 2005 at 12:04pm
Goldman Sachs research analyst David C. Bailey has maintained an “in-line” rating on Apple, but raised earnings estimates for the company, expecting holiday iPod demand and anticipation of upcoming product announcements to continue to drive earnings growth into 2006, reports Forbes. He also expects Apple to gradually move away from its “Mac core.”
“2006 will undoubtedly mark another major year in Apple’s transformation, but its new markets bring together tougher competition,” the analyst in a recent research note to clients. “If early indications from suppliers prove correct, Apple is likely to move further from its Mac core in 2006, leveraging its brand and building on the consumer success of iPod.”
He feels that Apple may announce new products over the next few months that could shift its center of gravity further into the consumer electronics realm, notes Forbes. Bailey feels Apple could announce its first real move into the digital entertainment hub market as early as next month’s Macworld Conference & Expo in San Francisco, in the form of an updated Mac mini that includes a remote control and Front Row software.
ken2 Says:
Apple may add products that are away from its core, but they will be designed to feed the beast and the beast is the Mac. Apple is around the fifth largest computer maker, is growing faster than the PC world and its computer business is very profitable, making market share rather unimportant. While the iPod is enjoying a very good run the Mac is the crown jewel, and will continue to be for a long time.
Posted on December 21, 2005
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Dennis Sellers
Dennis has been a newspaper editor/reporter (seven years) and teacher (seven years). He has over 4,000 magazine, newspaper and online articles to his credit. He has also covered the Mac and tech industries for over a decade for such online publications as MacCentral, MacMinute and now MacsimumNews.
J. Scott Anderson Says:
First, let me say that I think that Apple having more than just “Macs” is a good thing. Second, I don’t think that Macs, as we think of our beloved personal computing devices today, will be the same in the future. Rather than a little box sitting on or under our desks, I think that we’ll see them getting more personal as in wearing them, in some fashion. And I think we’ll stop seeing them at all, but they’ll still be there. They could be in our closet running our homes and in hidden compartments running our personal transportation vehicles. But I do believe that we will still be using Macintoshes well into the future.
Now, do you want to call these things consumer electronics? I don’t know and I am not sure the label really applies.
What do you, the readers, think?
Posted on December 21, 2005