苹果可能在哪些领域实施收购

苹果公司周二公布第二季度业绩后，许多投资者和分析师都在问，如果苹果为提振不断下滑的销售额开始收购，会买下哪家公司呢？

在周二的业绩发布会上，就连首席执行官蒂姆•库克都表示，苹果在收购方面“非常积极”，对更大规模的收购持开放态度。到目前为止，苹果最大笔收购是斥资30亿美元买下从事耳机制造和提供音乐流服务的Beats。

投资银行派杰公司董事总经理吉恩•蒙斯特指出，苹果可能会在三个关键领域收购，分别是汽车、虚拟现实以及混合现实。派杰公司维持苹果的“超配”，也就是“买入”评级，并将其目标股价定为104.35美元。

蒙斯特首先分析称，苹果收购特斯拉或者双方合并的可能性非常小。今年2月，彭博曾报道称，苹果负责并购事务的主管和特斯拉CEO埃隆•穆斯克见了面，但未披露任何细节。

蒙斯特写道：“如果收购特斯拉之类已有成熟品牌的公司，就没法在汽车领域拓展苹果的品牌。”他还说，苹果更想设计汽车，对制造兴趣不大，“我们认为，正在研发无人驾驶汽车的公司可能更适合苹果。”

据蒙斯特介绍，苹果也可能在虚拟现实领域收购，而且有可能出手兼并技术团队和相关产品，“包括头戴式混合现实显示、光场技术，或者能把手势等人类输入方式整合到计算机之中的技术等。”

混合现实领域也有可能成为苹果实现增长的关键，因为这种平台“就是我们能想象到的未来屏幕”，目前微软的Hololens全息眼镜等已经进入该领域试水。蒙斯特此前也曾预测，大约15年或者更久之后苹果会推出一款头戴式混合现实产品取代iPhone。

但他认为，有一个领域苹果不太可能追随另一巨头亚马逊的脚步，就是流媒体。

为了向消费者提供品类齐全的内容，苹果更有可能跟内容制作商合作，而不会收购电影公司。蒙斯特指出，“如果收购内容制作商，苹果跟不在旗下的内容提供商之间就会发生冲突。”

但蒙斯特也写道，为了进一步增长而收购乍看起来有吸引力，但不太可能让投资者满意，至少中期内，或者说今后1-2年内不能投资者都不会高兴。因为投资者迫切希望在一两年内看到成效。

蒙斯特称：“投资者希望苹果收购个公司，然后像吃了仙丹一样中短期业绩立刻大振，但在我们看来，问题在于能明显推动苹果今后1-2年增长的公司很可能都太大了，收购不了。虽然库克在大规模收购方面留有余地，但我们认为，值得苹果收购的大公司寥寥无几。”（财富中文网）

译者：Charlie

审校：夏林

Following Apple’s second quarter earnings yesterday, many investors and analysts were asking, if Apple does indeed enter an era of acquisitions in order to boost flagging sales—who will they buy?

After all, during the earnings call Tuesday, even CEO Tim Cook noted that the company was “very active” in the acquisition space, and he would be open to making acquisitions larger than the ones made so far. Apple largest acquisition to date was Beats for $3 billion.

So Piper Jaffray Managing Director Gene Munster noted the three key areas he sees Apple making acquisitions: The company’s automotive, virtual reality and mixed reality sectors. Piper Jaffray maintained an overweight rating on the stock, another way of saying buy, and set a price target of $104.35.

Munster started by saying that a potential Apple and Tesla merger or acquisition was highly unlikely. Back in February, Bloomberg reported that Apple’s acquisition chief and Tesla’s CEO Elon Musk met, though no details were leaked.

“We note that buying an established brand with significant brand equity like Tesla defeats the purpose of leveraging Apple’s brand on a car,” Munster wrote, adding that Apple wanted to design, not manufacture cars. “We believe companies developing autonomous vehicle capabilities could make sense for Apple.”

According to Munster, Apple is also likely to make acquisitions in the virtual reality space, and the company could gobble up “teams and products including head-mounted mixed reality displays, light-field technologies, and incorporating human input including hands into computers. ”

Mixed reality, a category that includes Microsoft’s Hololens, would also provide a key area of growth for Apple, since the platform is “the future of screens as we know them.” Munster has also previously predicted that Apple will release a mixed reality headsets to replace the cellphone in about 15 or more years.

But Munster noted one other area where Apple is unlikely to follow in the footsteps of its fellow giant, Amazon: Content streaming.

In order to offer its customers a full selection of content, Apple is more likely to form partnerships with content creators rather than acquire a studio. Munster noted that “if Apple were to acquire content creators, it would put it in conflict with those content owners that Apple did not own.”

But Munster also wrote that while acquisitions seem like an attractive option for further growth, the move is unlikely to please investors—at least not in the medium-term, or within the next one to two years. That’s because investors are thirsty for results within the next one or two years.

“Investors want Apple to buy companies as apanacea for growth in the near to medium term, but in our view the issue is that any companies that could meaningfully change Apple’s growth picture over the next one to two years are probably too large to acquire,” he wrote. “While Cook left the door open for larger deals, we believe there few large companies that make sense for Apple to buy.“