MSFT stock at 522 is undervalued; upside depends on new laptop launch materially impacting revenue projections.

It's time to delve deeper into our Microsoft story in the technology segment, and with me is Peter Arntzen, Chief Investment Officer and founder of Arntzen Capital Management .

We have news from Microsoft about the announcement of the new Surface Laptop Ultra powered by an Nvidia RTX Spark processor. Is this a great thing? Is this a historic moment? You tell me.

Well, I think Microsoft would like to think so . Yes, but I think there are other issues. The main question is, who ordered this product? Learn, we need to go back to the basics of marketing; If there is a need to fulfill something, this is of course a signal to the company to develop something.

So I think one of the lingering questions is how will this help Microsoft? I mean , will it attract early adopters? Do you mean programmers and animation experts? If so, this is a promising sign, but there is a big question mark over who the middle or late adopters will be, especially ordinary consumers. Do they need something like this at this stage?

Yes, you know, innovation is always a difficult subject and a crucial decision point when you're in a large company like this. Decisions are usually made collectively , so I think Microsoft is taking what I would call a marginal step rather than something revolutionary.

Of course it's impressive to have all these AI capabilities in a laptop, but for people like you, if I can speak for the rest, I don't know if we actually need that right now .

As I said, the developers are very excited about this, but for us, I think the current arrangement using remote data centers via the cloud suits us perfectly.

Well, I mean, it was also known, you know, that you mentioned artificial intelligence, and I think that's an interesting part . I mean, you could mention your opinion on Copilot, for example, but theoretically, this is supposed to compete with Apple, especially for AI developers, as I understand it.

Microsoft and Nvidia are together in this, as you know, to compete with the " MacBook Pro". So, will people really say, "This is what I want to do?"

Um, you know, they have serious computing power, and maybe that's something, I mean, we're thinking about at the price point. Do you think the price of $2500 was fair? I think it's very fair for what the product offers, but I think it's too expensive for the general public, and I don't think it's competitive at all.

But, as I said, for the more experienced programmer, this might be very exciting for them, and I truly believe that this introduction, this launch, was aimed directly at that type of user.

And I, as you know, think I've given a lot of thought to this, in terms of why Microsoft would do that? I imagined, you know, in the strategy room, why they might bring this up ?

I think it's fairly simple. I think their computer sales are weak, so they want to boost that. They justify it by including Nvidia, which adds to the credibility. Then they present it to the advanced user in the hope that they will adopt it.

But the big question surrounding this whole issue so far, and the last part of it, is whether the average consumer will do that?

Now, I know there are jokes about when the personal computer first appeared, where people were wondering why anyone would want to own a home computer ? And of course, as you know, after 20 to 30 years, we knew why.

So, it may be the same process , but it's a huge analytical leap in marketing strategy to believe that this will have a future, that most people will adopt it, and that they will pay this kind of price.

Yes, shipping starts on October 16, I think, and the price could go up a lot. I said 2500, that's a kind of starting price. It can reach more than 5000 if you equip it with all the capabilities.

But the power backing, the unified memory, and the AI performance it can do, presumably make a big deal with these AI models that have over 120 billion laboratories and operate locally.

Yes, I mean, you know, we annoyingly call it the " edge," which has become a term used to describe what you're talking about, i.e., the end user and the laptop. Therefore, I think it is absolutely true that everyone is involved in this.

I think Nvidia stands to benefit the most because they are probably looking at data centers and cloud applications and saying, "Okay, can we diversify our product line?" "Let's say something slowed down in that development."

We have seen that this has not yet happened, but let's suppose it has. At that point , Nvidia also thought: "Well, maybe we'll also have this channel, which is the end user, the laptop."

I mean, just think about it . It opens up a completely new business channel for Nvidia. I think that a year ago, if anyone had suggested that Nvidia would be interested in laptops, our first thought would have been : " Well, laptops are physically too small to accommodate these GPUs, relatively large GPUs."

So, now that they have solved that problem, I think they were very clever. I think they are more cunning than Microsoft at this stage.

Yes. And look, I mean, as I understand it, although I haven't confirmed this, I think if you hand in your Apple MacBook Pro , you can actually get some kind of cash refund for that device from Microsoft.

I mean, that's also an incentive that exists there. But it certainly seems geared more towards professionals, not just ordinary people using this.

When you talked about the stock, you wanted to know if this would lead to additional purchases. What do you think of Microsoft's current stock price of 522? What levels are you monitoring?

What do you expect for Microsoft in the next 6 to 12 months?

Well, I think the price now reflects the success in its other channels. The pressing question is the personal computer channel. Microsoft itself has admitted that it has been somewhat stagnant at this stage in terms of ideas until yesterday when they announced this.

So, depending on how things go, what we will be looking at is whether this new launch can materially impact revenue projections based on laptop sales. If that is the case, I believe the current share price is undervalued , because I truly believe that the current price reflects this uncertainty in this range.

Well, the current level is 522, which is the highest in the last 52 weeks, while Microsoft recorded 553. The stock has risen by about 8% since the beginning of the year. We'll see if this actually gets investors moving .

It is a somewhat new concept to think about integrating Nvidia technology into Microsoft computers, and perhaps HP and Dell, and who knows who else. This may be extended to include personal computers.

Lenovo was another company that was mentioned. So, we'll see what happens. Thank you.