Bob,
I hate to repeat what I was saying before, but I need to because I
just want to clarify the facts.
The Mac OS8 was on-time delivery, and the sales have reached 1.2
million copies, have surpassed 400% of Apple's estimates. It
indicates that under Dr. Avie Tevanian's supervison, Mac OS8 hits the
home run. It will be the same for Rhapsody next year. I truly
trust and respect his capabilities in technology as well as
management.
I like to count the beans regarding Q4 profit. The software is
the most profitable business (Microsoft is a good example) and hence
the revenue generated from OS8 is almost purely net income. From
this viewpoint, if Apple could sell 3 million copies (conservative
estimates) by the end of September, the revenue will be around
250-300 million dollars depending on the exact prices users pay.
This amount of cash will contribute to Q4 revenue. In addition,
due to this superior OS, some retailers have already reported that
Apple's hardware sales have increased by 30%. Let us conservatively
put 10% increase for the total hardware sales compared to the previous
quarter, which will generate another 150 million hard cash (provided
that 1.5 billion dollars hardware sales in previous quarter). We
sum up these two figures, there will be additional 400-450 million
dollars compared with previous quarter(Q3). It is remarkably clear
that Apple is gonig to have a very present quarter ahead of us.
Under Mr. Jobs direction, he collected all the possible goodies
together this week, and hence Wall Street responded to it accordingly.
Well, there will always be bumpy road ahead for Apple, but for 3-6
months timeframe, Apple looks so good and the price will be reacted
to its trend with more positive surprises in this period. I am very
happy and confident to take the ride. |
