Analyst: Apple-Wal-Mart Moves From Trial To Broad iPod Distribution

I was musing over a post on what seems to be an inventory pile-up of various iPods when I came across word of an expanding relationship between Apple and Wal-Mart that would seem to render those concerns moot, at least for now. Merrill Lynch analyst Rebecca Runkle is telling clients that the two have moved from the trial phase to broader distribution and a partnership. Her conservative estimates, according to MarketWatch: Wal-Mart could up iPod sales by 100,000 and add $80 millio in revenue over the course of a year. She views the partnership “as a positive — a way to expand the brand to the mainstream and additive to the bottom-line.” And, she wrote, “we do think the partnership is broader than people think, in transition and set to expand in the near-term.” (Runkle also wrote in her note that the inventory issues may be “overblown.”)
But — and I say this in the kindest way as someone who has spent her share of dollars in Wal-Marts on road trips across the U.S. — can iPod be in Wal-Mart and keep its cool quotient up? And how problematic is it for Wal-Mart that the iPod and the mega-retailer’s own music store don’t talk to each other? (Wal-Mart uses WMP DRM.) Or is the latter a problem the two have already figured out how to resolve? (via ipodlounge.
Also from The Mac Observer.

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