(By Balachander) Deutsche Bank analyst Brian Modoff launched coverage of shares of Audience Inc. (NASDAQ:ADNC) with a "Buy" rating and a price target of $23.
Mountain View, California-based Audience - formerly known as Applied Neurosystems Corp.- provides voice and audio processors for mobile devices.
Modoff is of the view that Audience has reinvigorated the once sleepy area of cellular audio quality. They have spent years convincing carriers and handset vendors of the benefits of voice enhancements. This first mover advantage should allow them to reap benefits by setting the benchmarks for others to follow.
The analyst thinks such enhancements will become commonplace across all phones in coming years, and Audience is in the lead of that process.
Audience is expanding its presence among smartphone makers and Modoff believes they are now integrated into Apple's (AAPL)A5 applications processor and are a standard technology in all iPhones.
The company is also picking up designs at most of the other major handset vendors that Modoff thinks will lead to strong growth as smartphones take off around the world.
Modoff cited risks of overall growth of smartphone adoption, the potential for increased competition and revenue concentration in a small number of customers.
ADNC shares, which have been trading in the 52-week range between $16.66 and $20.50, rose 4.08 percent to trade at $17.85 on Monday.