Gateway posts record numbers

Gateway 2000 (GATE), one of the largest direct marketers of personal computers, today reported its best yearly results ever thanks in part to record fourth-quarter PC shipments.

Gateway says that fourth-quarter net income rose 50 percent to $88.1 million, or $1.12 per share, which compares to $58.8 million, or 74 cents per share for the same period of 1995. The earnings topped financial analysts' estimates of $1.01 per share, according to First Call.

The company also said quarterly revenue was $1.55 billion, a 25 percent increase from a year ago.

Yearly sales figures grew 43 percent over the same period last year, Gateway said, totaling 1,909,000 units.

According to a recent Computer Intelligence survey, the vendor now has 7.1 percent market share in the United States.

Gateway attributed the results to a product mix that included a number of models featuring higher-performance Pentium Pro processors from Intel, which typically also meant a higher gross margin on products than those with the Pentium processor.

Indeed, the company reported that gross margins for the quarter hit 19.5 percent, a record high, and Pentium Pro models accounted for nearly 21 percent of all desktop models sold.