Apple iPad Not Hurting Mac Sales

So far, Apple’s popular iPad tablet does not appear to be cannibalizing the company’s PC sales. Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) recently announced that its share of the PC market hit 4.19% in the second quarter of 2010, up from 3.49% in the first quarter. Apple competes with other PC manufacturers like Dell (NASDAQ:DELL) and HP (NYSE:HPQ).

Apple’s PC share gains came despite the April 3 launch of the iPad tablet computer. Considering Apple’s robust PC market performance, it does not appear that many consumers are choosing iPads over Apple Macintosh notebook or desktop PCs. We believe this could be due to the halo effect that the ballyhooed iPad launch created around all Apple products, including Macs.

It remains to be seen whether iPad will become a cannibalistic threat to the Mac in the long term. Our analysis follows below.

Mac share forecast

According to management, Apple sold 3.47 million Macs in the second quarter of 2010, which is 18% more than the 2.94 million Macs sold in the first quarter. Worldwide PC shipments totalled 82.87 million in Q2 of 2010, down from 84.37 million in Q1, according to Gartner, a tech market research firm. Meanwhile, we expect Apple to sell around 10 million iPads in all of 2010.

We estimate that Macintosh PCs constitute 14% of the $337 Trefis price estimate for Apple’s stock. We expect Mac notebooks to increase their market share from 5.04% in 2009 to 8.74% by the end of the Trefis forecast period. We expect Apple’s desktop market share to increase from 2.69% in 2009 to 6.49% by 2016.

Based on Apple’s PC market share gains in the second quarter of this year, when the iPad launch dominated media coverage of Apple, we see potential for Mac sales to increase even more rapidly than our current forecast. In the event that Apple’s notebook share increases to 10% and its desktop share increases to 8% by 2016, there could be an upside of of 2% to the $337 Trefis price estimate for Apple’s stock.

You can drag the trend-lines in the charts below to create your own forecasts for Apple’s notebook and desktop market shares, respectively, and see how they impact the company’s stock price.

Halo effect?

Although the iPad may well be boosting Mac sales in the short term by stimulating consumer interest in all things Apple, we can’t say whether this happy trend has long-term legs. In the past, the iPod has exerted a similar halo effect on Mac sales. On the other hand, the iPhone cannibalized a significant portion of iPod sales.

In another article, we discussed the possible impact of iPad cannibalization on Mac sales.

This article has been updated at the request of the author. The original version stated Trefis expectations for 4 million iPad sales in 2010, instead of 10 million as shown on Trefis.com. The mistake was editorial and does not represent a change in the Trefis forecast since publication.

Disclosure: No positions