Big Apple iPhone orders, bigger sales goals 'make sense,' analyst says

Computerworld - Talk of Apple Inc. placing large iPhone orders to its Asian suppliers and predictions that the company will dramatically ramp up sales later this year and into next "make perfect sense," according to one analyst.

Ezra Gottheil of Technology Business Research Inc. said reports last week that Apple had put in orders for 10 million 3G-ready iPhones were probably on the money. Like other analysts, Gottheil had previously pegged June as the most likely date for an Apple launch of a next-generation iPhone able to use the faster 3G networks.

"A 10 million order for 3G iPhones for delivery over the remainder of the year makes perfect sense," Gottheil said. "Apple's going to try very hard to make its [sales goal] number, and that means releasing a 3G model or lowering the price or both. All of that is consistent with what it's said already."

Apple has repeatedly said that it will sell 10 million iPhones by the end of this year.

Currently, iPhones connect only to an EDGE-based network for data-transmission chores such as Web browsing and e-mail. EDGE is considerably slower than 3G, however, which in AT&T Inc.'s case uses HSDPA/UMTS technology.

Last November, AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson said that a 3G iPhone would debut in 2008.

The large order was initially reported last week by the iPodObserver Web site, which said that Gartner analyst Ken Dulaney had noted rumors out of Asia to that effect. However, some sites and blogs that picked up on the iPodObserver story amplified Dulaney's comments and made it sound like the order for 10 million 3G iPhones was a fact.

"This was a rumor from an unnamed source I was commenting on in terms of the likelihood of being possible," said Dulaney in an e-mail last week when asked to clarify his comments. "Some of the press articles interpreted this as being a fact that I knew about or that Gartner had predicted this. That part was incorrect."

But like Gottheil today, Dulaney last week said the rumors sounded credible. "Since Jobs said he will sell out all 10 million of the current order, it is likely another order has already been put in place," Dulaney said. "It seems logical. As to when and the exact amount, it's open to speculation."

Today, another prominent analyst weighed in with a projection that Apple will sell a total of 45 million iPhones by the end of 2009. In a research note released today, Gene Munster of Piper Jaffray & Co. stuck to an earlier prediction that Apple will reach that mark by the end of next year.