Holiday sales may prove just enough to satisfy apprehensive vendors of high-tech goods, but the early months of next year are anyone’s guess.
Apple increased iPhone production plans, analyst says
Could the worry about the start of 2009 be easing?
According to one analyst, Apple has begun lessening the size of planned production cuts and the orders it places for components are stabilizing.
In particular, Apple has raised its iPhone production target for the first three months of next year by 8 percent, after deciding to cut production 20 percent in during this year’s holiday period, says Craig Berger, a Wall Street analyst at FBR Capital Markets. Berger said this latest adjustment is a revision of the company’s production plans from early November.
They imply sales of 10.5 million iPhones in the final three months of 2008.
While plans for iPod production appears to have declined from Apple’s November target, computer manufacturing plans are unchanged in aggregate, with the company building more desktops but fewer laptops for the first part of next year.
“The magnitude of recent productions cuts is lessening,” Berger wrote Wednesday in his research report.
