Earnings

Intel CEO addresses Microsoft Office on ARM

Intel CEO Paul Otellini characterized the prospect of Microsoft Office running on ARM chips as a potential "downside" during an earnings call today before trying to allay any fears of encroachment into the traditional PC market.

It is axiomatic that Microsoft Office, the worldwide gold standard for office application suites, has been one of the main reasons Windows software and Intel processors have such staying power. So, the specter of Office running on top of ARM processors from Intel chip rivals in the future is no small concern for the world's largest chipmaker. Microsoft said last week at CES … Read more

Intel CEO: How we will compete with ARM

Intel CEO Paul Otellini today spelled out how his company will compete with the burgeoning ARM chip ecosystem, which has taken the lead in tablet designs, during the chipmaker's fourth-quarter earnings conference call.

In the call, Otellini was quick to address tablets, a market currently centered on Apple's iPad, which runs on Apple's flavor of the ARM processor design. Motorola, RIM, and Samsung have also based their tablet products on power-efficient ARM processors. He discussed a few ways Intel could ultimately prevail in the tablet and smartphone markets.

Operating system three-fer: "In 2011, you will also … Read more

Intel earnings zoom up 48 percent

Microprocessor heavyweight Intel today posted a 48 percent jump in net income over the same period last year on strong server demand, while revenue was up slightly.

The world's largest chipmaker reported fourth-quarter profit of $3.39 billion, or 59 cents a share, a 48 percent increase over the same period last year when it reported a profit of $2.28 billion, or 40 cents a share.

Revenue for the quarter, which ended December 25, was up 8 percent to $11.46 billion, from $10.57 billion. Analysts had expected revenue of $11.38 billion.

Gross margin, a key … Read more

Obama cites Steve Jobs' wealth, product success

President Obama today cited Apple CEO Steve Jobs' product success as an example of a person who Americans should "expect to be rich" as an incentive for others.

Responding to a reporter's question, the president prefaced his comments about Steve Jobs and Apple by saying, "What is...a fact is that people in the top 1 percent, people in the top one-tenth of 1 percent, or one-hundredth of 1 percent have a larger share of income and wealth than any time since the 1920s. Those are just facts. That's not a feeling on the part … Read more

U.S. chip manufacturing in the age of the iPad

Behind the fly-off-the-shelf popularity of products like Apple's iPad and iPhone are hundreds of thousands of manufacturing jobs--mostly overseas. Is it possible to create more of those jobs here in the U.S. to combat chronically high levels of unemployment?

Personal computing is moving rapidly beyond the laptop. And there's no better example than Apple, whose most popular products are arguably now the iPhone and the iPad. The surging demand for anything Apple is causing a seismic shift in chip manufacturing to Asia, the hotbed of new silicon ecosystems. Though companies like Hewlett-Packard and Dell also play a … Read more

Intel quarterly revenue hits record $11.1 billion

Intel's revenue in the third quarter jumped 18 percent year-over-year, while profits also shot up over the previous year.

The world's largest chipmaker reported revenue of $11.1 billion, earning 52 cents per share and beating the analyst consensus of about 50 cents per share. This compares to $9.4 billion in revenue in the year-earlier period, or 33 cents a share.

Intel said back in August that its third-quarter revenue would be below the company's prior outlook, due to weak demand for consumer PCs, and at that time said it expected to post third-quarter revenue of about $11 billion.

Profits shot up in the third quarter to $3 billion, topping last year's third quarter of $1.9 billion and this year's prior quarter of $2.9 billion.

Gross margin, a crucial profit indicator, was 66 percent, meeting Wall Street expectations.

"Intel's third-quarter results set all-time records for revenue and operating income," said Paul Otellini, Intel president and CEO, in a statement. "These results were driven by solid demand from corporate customers, sales of our leadership products and continued growth in emerging markets," Otellini said.

"Looking forward, we...are particularly excited about our next-generation processor, code-named Sandy Bridge, and the many new designs around our Intel Atom processors in everything from the new Google TV products to a wide array of tablets based on Windows, Android, and MeeGo operating systems," he said.

During today's earnings conference call, Otellini had a lot to say about Sandy Bridge, which is expected to… Read more

Report: Oracle sues Micron over chip pricing

Oracle has sued Micron Technology, alleging the chipmaker overcharged Sun Microsystems for memory chips, according to a report.

Micron and other manufacturers of dynamic random access memory (DRAM) "artificially inflated" the price of chips, according to an Oracle complaint filed Friday in federal court in San Jose, Calif., Bloomberg reported.

The Oracle suit is based on DRAM sales made to Sun. Oracle acquired Sun in January.

While other companies, such as Hynix Semiconductor and Samsung Electronics, are cited as "co-conspirators," they're not named as defendants.

The origin of the case goes back to a 2002 … Read more

AMD follows Intel, warns on third-quarter revenue

AMD said today that it expects revenue for the third quarter to be lower than the previous quarter. This comes on the heels of Intel's warning in August.

The Sunnyvale, Calif.-based chipmaker's terse release said revenue in its third quarter, ending September 25, will be in the "range of down one to four percent as compared to revenue of $1.65 billion for the quarter ended June 26, 2010."

"The sequential decrease is due to weaker than expected demand, particularly in the consumer notebook market in Western Europe and North America," the company … Read more

Intel says third-quarter revenue below guidance

Intel said Friday that its third-quarter revenue will be below the company's prior outlook.

The world's largest chipmaker now expects third-quarter revenue to be $11 billion, plus or minus $200 million, compared with the previous expectation of between $11.2 and $12 billion.

Revenue has been squeezed by weaker than expected demand for consumer PCs in "mature" markets, but inventories across the supply chain appear to be in-line with the company's revised expectations, Intel said.

That jibes with a cautious forecast for the third quarter from IDC. The market researcher said last week that global … Read more