Big year for NeoMagic

NeoMagic continues to reap the rewards of its strong position in the notebook PC graphics market.

The company today reported net sales for the fiscal year ended January 31, 1999, of $240.5 million, an increase of 93 percent compared to net sales of $124.7 million for fiscal 1998.

Net income for fiscal 1999 was $31.2 million, or $1.19 per diluted share, compared to net income of $20.8 million, or $0.82 per diluted share in fiscal 1998.

NeoMagic also announced today the acquisition of the UK-based Optical Drive Development Group of Mitel Semiconductor and the acquisition of the assets and intellectual properties of ACL of Israel.

"NeoMagic is pursuing a multi-market strategy extending beyond the notebook arena and into new markets," CEO Prakash Agarwal said in a statement. "We are firmly embarked upon new product development activities for two new markets: DVDs and digital cameras."

Notebook manufacturers are using more powerful graphics chips across their product lines in order to establish parity with desktop computers that typically carry the most powerful graphics processors. Companies such as IBM, Dell Computer, Hewlett-Packard, and Gateway use NeoMagic chips in their notebooks.

Last June, NeoMagic launched the industry's first 256-bit multimedia family, the MagicMedia256 line. Generally, the wider the data path, the better the performance. Most chips today come with a 64- or 128-bit data path.

This line also offers AGP graphics, acceleration for DVD video playback, and is also the first chip to integrate video and graphics with digital audio, eliminating the need for a separate audio chip, according to the company.

NeoMagic's net sales for the fourth quarter of fiscal 1999 were $72.0 million, an increase of 61 percent compared to net sales of $44.7 million in the fourth quarter of fiscal 1998, and an increase of 7 percent compared to net sales of $67.4 million in the third quarter of fiscal 1999. Net income for the fourth quarter of fiscal 1999 was $9 million, compared to net income of $8.2 million in the fourth quarter of fiscal 1998.