Piper Jaffray analyst and resident Apple watcher Gene Munster is taking a gigantic step back from his previous predictions about Apple launching a connected HDTV product.
Apple has been rumored to be working on said product since 2009.
But Munster went on record Tuesday following a WSJ report noting that Apple formally abandoned the concept over a year ago.
“Based on this report, we no longer expect a television to launch indefinitely,” Munster is quoted by Barrons. “Given that overall investor expectations for a television were low and Street estimates did not reflect a television, we believe there will be no sustained impact to shares of AAPL.”
So why the change of course for Apple?
“We have been talking about an Apple television for the better part of the last decade,” the analyst continues. “While it is a small consolation that the article affirms that Apple was actually working on a television during that period, in the end we were wrong in our constant expectation of the product. Originally we had expected that content was the reason for the delay; however, we misidentified the true reason for delay , which was a lack of perceived killer features as reported by the WSJ. We incorrectly assumed that a combination of Siri, FaceTime, a TV app store, and PrimeSense based motion control could be compelling enough as a unique feature set for the device.”
