Apple is getting mixed reviews from Wall Street analysts for its two-hour long keynote this morning at the 2012 Worldwide Developers Conference at Moscone West in San Francisco. (You can read my live blog for all the gory details.) While Apple actually addressed most of the items the Street had expected, there were a couple of spots that may be the cause for disappointment. There was no talk of Apple televisions, or even an update of the Apple TV box the company now sells. There were no updates announced to the iMac line of desktop computers. And the company chose a conservative approach to pricing the latest generation of MacBook Airs, leaving plenty of room for makers of Intel-based Ultrabooks to offer light-weight flash-based laptops of their own at prices well below the entry level $999 Air.
Here's a quick look at some of the early Street commentary on the event:
- Gene Munter, Piper Jaffray: "The key take away is today’s announcements give us greater confidence in the sustainability and defensibility of the Apple franchise," he writes in a research note. "While Android is Apple’s greatest threat, Apple's offering is continuing to strengthen iOS against Android by tightening the ecosystem with other Apple devices in addition to sewing together numerous premium web partners. In emerging markets we expect Android to maintain a healthy market share lead, but believe today’s news lays the ground work for Apple to gain share faster than Android in the U.S, and potentially in western Europe over the next year, which we estimate account for ~65% of iPhone units. This gives us increased confidence that iPhone global market share will increase from 23% today to 33% in 2015 (in line with our model); more importantly, we continue to believe Apple can grow revenue at 25% plus through the end of 2015."
- William Power, Baird Equity Research: "At its World Wide Developers Conference in San Francisco this afternoon, Apple introduced iOS 6 and OS X Mountain Lion, its next generation mobile and desktop operating systems," he writes. "We came away positive on the increasing synergies between the two platforms, which we believe increases the stickiness of the Apple ecosystem." He adds that "contrary to some expectations, Apple did not release an Apple TV SDK or drop any clues related to an Apple TV set. Some also thought Apple could provide some clues around iPhone 5 hardware given speculation around a change in the screen's aspect ratio, though no details were provided."
- Peter Misek, Jefferies: "Apple refreshed the MacBook Air and MacBook Pro lines, and introduced the next-generation Macbook Pro," he writes in a research note. "The new Mountain Lion and iOS 6 operating systems were introduced with more iCloud features, deep Facebook integration, and more voice support. Tim Cook delivered a solid performance aided by a strong cast, in our view. We believe there are plenty of new products and updates for both developers and consumers to get excited about." Adds Misek: "We believe there was too much content for a TV to be announced. We now see a TV being unveiled at its own event likely within the next 3 to 6 months. We believe the launch of the device is still a [second half] 2012 event."
- Scott Kessler, S&P Capital IQ: He repeated his Buy rating on the shares. "At its Worldwide Developers Conference, AAPL announced and showed/demonstrated new versions of the MacBook Pro and MacBook Air with new processors and graphics capabilities, the OS X Mountain Lion desktop operating system, and the iOS 6 mobile operating system," he writes. "iOS 6 will have 200+ new features, including new proprietary map offerings, Siri functionality with broader language capabilities and deeper content in certain categories, and notable integrations with Facebook. We expect a new iPhone to become available around when iOS 6 becomes available, in the early fall."
AAPL, which in the regular session fell $9.15, or 1.6%, to $571.17, is down another 14 cents after hours.
