RBC Expects Apple's Siri To Be A WWDC Focus

Apple Inc. AAPL is hosting its annual Worldwide Developer Conference (WWDC) on June 13-17 in San Francisco, and RBC expects Siri to hog the limelight this year, along with extensive OS upgrades and potential macbook pro refresh.

Siri SDK & More: "Expect AAPL to showcase Siri SDK for 3rdparty developers to expand use cases for Siri and lay groundwork for a wifi-enabled personal assistant (Like Amazon Echo)."

"We expect a more robust integration of various OS's across AAPL's ecosystem, with Siri taking the center stage in terms of integration," Amit Daryanani wrote in a note. For example, MacOS is expected to get Siri integration to further drive usage of Apple's voice assistant.

Related Link: Goldman Lowers iPhone Estimates, Cuts Apple's Price Target By 9%

Daryanani expects some discussion on integrating VocaIIQ (Apple's acquisition in late 2015) and laying the groundwork to launch a more comprehensive artificial intelligence-powered personal assistant device. The analyst says the company may launch the potential device either as a standalone product like Amazon Echo or integrate into existing hardware like Apple TV.

Stock Focus

On the stock front, Daryanani said Apple shares are set for a near-term rally, but within the range of $90-$120.

"While we realize that elongating iPhone cycles would keep a lid on revenue/EPS growth for AAPL till we get an innovative iPhone iteration in FY17, we think iPhone 7 will at minimum drive stable and mid-single digit unit growth," Daryanani highlighted.

"Simplistically, we think it is prudent to look at iPhone growth over 2-year cycles vs. extrapolating one year trends too far up (iPhone 6) or down (iPhone 5c and 6s?)," the analyst added.

Daryanani has an Outperform rating and $120 price target on the stock.