Read here, so far most anal-ists are good with it, BMO on the other hand can swim w the shorties....let's see how much $$$ the shorts can make, starting tomorrow...they sure seem joyous for the stock to drop, I bet it surprises longs....TOMORROW BY EOD!
Apple (AAPL) last night announced a major renovation of top leadership, ousting John Browett, its head of retail operations, hired only last January, and saying Scott Forstall, its head of software development for the iOS operating system that powers the iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch, will leave next year, his duties being taken over by two senior executives, Jony Ive, the head of Apple’s hardware design, and Craig Federighi, who has been overseeing development of the desktop OS X operating system.
Along with Forstall and Browett’s departure, the company said former engineering director Bob Mansfield will lead a new group that consolidates Apple’s chip design and wireless technologies, and it said Eddy Cue, who has run the iTunes store and other initiates such as the App Store, will take over responsibility for the “Siri” artificial intelligence assistant on the iPhone, and for the new Maps program that Apple introduced in September.
The Street this morning seems to be fairly happy about all of these developments. Browett’s departure is generally regarded as necessary to save Apple’s retail store from losing their reputation for service. Forstall’s departure is more of a surprise to people, and somewhat mixed in terms of its implications. There is a tremendous amount of faith in Jony Ive, but also a sense that it’s not a great thing for Apple to lose a talented veteran like Forstall.
Piper Jaffray’s Gene Munster, who has an Overweight rating on shares of Apple, and a $900 price target, expressed relief that the changes seem to imply that Jony Ive will stick around for awhile, which would have been a concern for investors given his prominence. He notes, too, that Cook has nine years remaining on his contract with the company.
Regardless of the exact circumstances of Forstall’s departure, “what is known is Apple is consolidating leadership around core long term executives, and the probability that the key management is committed to Apple appears to have increased,” writes Munster.
Brian White of Topeka Capital Markets, who has a Buy rating on Apple shares and $1,111 price target, writes that the shake-up “a natural evolution at Apple as the Company increasingly pushes for a more seamless integration across devices and even better, more integrated experience for customers.”
William Power with R.W. Baird, who has an Outperform rating on the stock and a $750 price target, today writes that Forstall’s departure was a surprise, and that it “appears to be part of Tim Cook putting his own stamp on the company,” and that “he is still surrounded by several key long-time Apple executives and innovators.”
Brian Marshall of ISI Group wrote last night, While we view Forstall as key to AAPL’s success having been head of the “all-important” iOS platform and are very disappointed to see him go, there’s no change to our current positive view on AAPL.
“We believe if the company can be successful without Steve Jobs, it can be successful without Scott Forstall.”
The least satisfied of these five analysts is Keith Bachmann of BMO Capital Markets, who has an Outperform rating on the shares and a $730 price target. Writes Bachmnan, the change is “a disappointment.”
Mr. Forstall, who ran the mobile operating system unit, was very successful even under the demanding and watchful eye of Steve Jobs. While the new mapping service in the new iPhone is poor, we believe that over the course of his 15-year career at Apple, Mr. Forstall added value. With Mr. Jobs, it was always clear who was in charge of almost every decision. With Tim Cook, our take is that he is a “leader of leaders,” which likely allows for more give and take, or even dissent, on key issues amongst executives. The sustained value of the implied new organizational structure will depend on the abilities and personalities of Apple’s leaders. With a large base of approximately 60,400 full-time employees, it would be easy to conclude that the departures are not important. However, we do believe the departures are a negative, since we think Mr. Forstall in particular added value to Apple. However, we are not surprised that he would leave in a post Steve Jobs organizational structure, given his very strong personality.
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