AT&T Renewal Concerns Present Buying Opportunity for Synchronoss

Wedbush Securities views recent weakness likely due to concerns and confusion over the AT&T (NYSE: T) renewal, as an opportunistic entry point in shares of Synchronoss Technologies, Inc. (NASDAQ: SNCR). The brokerage reiterated its outperform rating on shares of Synchronoss with a price target of $36.

We expect Synchronoss to continue to benefit from robust growth in connected devices, adoption of online activation and provisioning, new and existing customer momentum, and new services. We see minimal risk with AT&T renewal, with potential material upside driven by the T-Mobile USA acquisition in 2012, said Scott Sutherland, an analyst at Wedbush Securities.

Sutherland said AT&T renews at the end of 2012 with the potential for two one-year automatic renewals with the same terms. He believes recent commentary has led to investor concerns and that Synchronoss has provided AT&T with cost-saving solutions and the only viable alternative would be in-house.

Thus, with AT&T shifting more channels to Synchronoss, Sutherland sees minimal risk. He suggests that it would make sense for AT&T to opt for one of the one-year renewals as focus is on closing T-Mobile USA, which could also impact a new contract (positively). Of note, he estimates T-Mobile would increase AT&T’s wireless subscriber base by about 25 percent.

Furthermore, AT&T indicated that over time it would have to replace T-Mobile phones with new phones that use AT&T 3G frequencies. Sutherland believes this would be an excellent entry point for the FusionOne technology to port content over to new phones. He noted that AT&T accounted for 51 percent of revenues for first quarter.

SmartMobility is a management platform for connectivity, network selection, offloading, and other services. While connectivity in the past was mostly applied to software on dongles and aircards (he estimates about $5 per device), Sutherland believes this is moving to a platform play with a smaller per device fee plus a recurring per sub fee to manage the services in the cloud.

We also expect this to expand to different types of connected devices, namely smartphones and tablets. Sychronoss is testing this service with a Tier 1 carrier (we believe Verizon) and two device original equipment manufacturers (OEMs). We expect this to drive additional growth on top of continued growth in connected devices, online adoption, and momentum with new and existing customers, said Sutherland.

Synchronoss stock closed Thursday's regular trading up 4.21 percent at $30.67 on the NASDAQ Stock Market.