Assuming nothing dramatic happens in the last week of September, on Friday, the Nasdaq index will close a fourth successive month of rises. So far this year, the index has risen no less than 22%, led by Apple (AAPL), which rose by 74% in advance of the “mother of all launches” of the iPhone 5. In the first few days after the launch, it has been hard to find anyone disappointed, with the handset itself, or with the sales hysteria all over the world.

From an Israeli point of view, the iPhone 5 is great news for SanDisk Corporation (Nasdaq:SNDK). At least in the most popular model, the 32 GB device, the tear down sites have found its flash solution, and, according to analysts from JP Morgan (JPM), this is a unique solution that also includes SanDisk’s controller. This is cause for Israeli celebration not just because of SanDisk’s large presence here, but also because SanDisk Israel manager Dan Inbar is also the company’s general manager of OEM, and in that role is responsible for sales to Apple.

SanDisk will presumably also be in the iPad Mini, which is meant to come onto the market by the end of the year, together with the new series of iPods that Apple unveiled two weeks ago together with the iPhone 5, which will be Christmas hits in the media player niche. As far as the effect on the share price is concerned, although SanDisk’s management guided in July for growth in the September quarter compared with June, it is unlikely that they took into account a substantial contribution from Apple.

It is well known that Apple guards precise launch dates even from its suppliers, and until not long ago the working assumption was that the new iPhone would start to contribute to Apple and its suppliers only from the fourth quarter. Because of the early launch, ten days before the end of the third quarter, together with the dizzying success, I expect SanDisk’s results for the current quarter to be better than the guidance and market estimates…Read More>>

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