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The Next iMac, and Apple In The Recession

Posted by: Arik Hesseldahl on February 03

Shortages in channel inventory is usually a textbook indicator that an Apple product is about to receive an update. And so it has been in recent days with the iMac, Apple’s popular consumer-grade desktop model. Analyst Shaw Wu of Kaufman Bros. Equity Research has a theory that Apple is going to launch a two-tier iMac family, one with powerful Intel Quad-core Xeon chips, similar to what’s found in the Mac Pro now, and one with the latest version of Intel’s Core 2 Duo chips, which have two cores.

“We are now hearing that both types of processors will likely be used. We believe this makes sense as this helps Apple create better tiers within the iMac family, utilizing quad-core for the high-end, and dual-core for mid-range and low-end,” he wrote in a research note out Feb. 2.

A refresh would certainly be welcome news, because it usually stimulate sales. And sales of desktop Macs have been one weakness in Apple’s relatively strong performance. Desktop sales declined 25% year-on-year and 22% sequentially on a unit basis. Desktop revenue fell even more: $1.04 billion, down from $1.5 billion a year ago. True, a lot of that has to do with the powerful growth in notebooks, which on a unit basis grew 34% year-on-year and 7% sequentially.

On the subject of growth, Wu has another note out today commenting on the latest operating system market share data from Net Applications which shows the Mac’s share of systems in use accounted for 9.93% of systems in January, while the iPhone accounted for 0.48%. Combine them and OS X made up 10.41% of systems in use. Windows saw its share of this chart decline slightly to 88.26% from 88.7% in December. That’s a good indicator, Wu argues for growth at Apple, despite the downturn. “We believe these datapoints further support our key investment thesis in that Apple is still an early platform adoption story with plenty of headroom for growth, driven by the iPhone and Mac,” he wrote.

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Reader Comments

KenC

February 3, 2009 07:44 PM

It doesn't take a financial analyst to tell you that there is a shortage in channel inventory. Oppenheimer stated it in the conference call that Mac inventory was 3 to 4 weeks, which is below the normal level of 5 to 6 weeks.

And, wasn't there also a 0.11% usage share for the iPod Touch? Wouldn't that bring the 10.41% up to 10.52% share for all OS X systems?

Paul

February 4, 2009 03:53 AM

A new Mac Mini please Apple. Being so small Minis make excellent value small scale web servers.

Please upgrade the Mini along with the new iMac's.

Rolf Bork

February 4, 2009 07:44 AM

Regarding "two-tier iMac family": here is a wild speculation about the low end version of next iMac:
Repackaged iPod Touch - its guts plus a key board and a larger screen and added memory might be all it takes. Such move would enhance Apples economy of scale for iPhone & iPod Touch. Apple might even use the dual iMac strategy to through their first PA Semi chips (with low cost PowerPC inside) onto the market....later to be followed by a low end iBook generation using same parts/modules.

Rolf Bork, BOD mediaf.com & sensitivetch.com

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A blog on the daily doings of Apple and the many companies in its orbit, with insight and analysis by two longtime Apple-watchers BusinessWeek Senior Writer Peter Burrows and BusinessWeek.com Senior Technology Writer Arik Hesseldahl.

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