Apple iPad: Analyst Tones Down Excitement Over Device
This one caught our eye. Needham analysts issued a note sounded quite a bit more cautious on forecasts for iPad sales Wednesday, “after watching a replay of Apple’s iPad introduction and reassessing the device’s potential.”
In a note entitled “Seeing is Believing”–their previous note was subtitled “Apple has Another Winner”–Needham revised its original forecast of four million iPad sales in the year following the device’s April launch. “We’re now forecasting iPad sales of two million units in fiscal 2010 and six million in 2011. Our forecast assumes that over half of iPad sales come at the expense of the iPod touch.” Needham analysts said they revised their call “after watching a replay of Apple’s iPad introduction and reassessing the device’s potential.” Previously Needham analysts said Apple could sell four million units in the year after the iPad’s April launch. (Needham doesn’t provide an apples-to-apples comparison of its original call for the iPad to sell four million between April 2010 and April 2011.)
