Is The Time Right For Apple To Buy Sonos

More than a few sites have been talking about the potential for Apple to purchase Sonos - and with good reason. Apple has a hole in its smart speaker market offering which could be filled by leveraging existing Sonos offerings and a combination of Apple and Sonos team for future products.

The HomePod hasn't set the world alight and Apple hasn't, as yet, shown any indication of widening the HomePod family to try and increase adoption. Having a proven product range to which it can retrofit Siri and Home integration must be attractive to Apple's product teams.

It's also a financially attractive deal. Sonos' market cap is relatively low at the moment and Apple could easily make the acquisition with the change it finds down the back of the sofa in Tim Cook's office.

Sonos has every incentive to sell too. It is being squeezed on all sides, Google and Amazon from above and below; Apple from above. The cost of competing with giants as the market grows isn't sustainable for the company and its best case scenario, if it stays independent is to become a niche player in a premium corner of the market which doesn't default to Apple products.

A sale to Apple would allow the company to return value to shareholders and give it a solid footing for the future. In the same way Apple has integrated Beats without killing the Beats brand or buzz.

Apple claims to buy companies all the time. There's a good argument to be made for making Sonos the next one.