Overseas
Business
ON Semiconductor plans to install another $15,7 million worth of production equipment in its eight-inch Pocatello, Idaho, wafer manufacturing facility during the next six months. This investment is in addition to the company’s announcement in June of an $11 million equipment expansion. The company says this second capital will lead to additional hiring of staff at the facility which currently employs approximately 635 people. The local Pocatello campus houses ON Semiconductor’s Fab 10, an eight-inch wafer production facility specialising in the manufacture of application specific integrated circuits (ASICs) and standard products for the automotive, medical, industrial and military/aerospace markets.
Maxim recently qualified and shipped analog products built on 300 mm wafers, an achievement made possible thanks to a foundry agreement with Powerchip Technology Corporation’s wafer fab. Maxim believes this move will give it a significant technology edge in the analog/mixed-signal market, although the company has not elaborated on what form this advantage might take. This move extends Maxim’s hybrid approach to wafer fab capacity, utilising both in-house and outsourced wafer fabrication.
RF Micro Devices reported financial results for its fiscal 2011 second quarter, ended 2 October 2010. Quarterly revenue increased approximately 12% year-over-year and 4,4% sequentially to $285,8 million. On a GAAP basis, gross margin equalled 38,0%, quarterly operating income totalled $42,4 million, and quarterly net income was $35,1 million, or $0,13 per diluted share.
Cree announced record revenue of $268,4 million for its first quarter of fiscal 2011, ended 26 September 2010. This represents a 59% increase compared to revenue of $169,1 million reported for the first fiscal quarter last year and a 1,5% increase compared to the fourth quarter of fiscal 2010. GAAP net income for the first quarter increased 176% year-over-year to $58,0 million, or $0,53 per diluted share, compared to GAAP net income of $21,0 million, or $0,23 per diluted share, for the first quarter of fiscal 2010.
ON Semiconductor announced that total revenues in the third quarter of 2010 were $600,7 million, an increase of approximately 3% from the second quarter of 2010. During the third quarter of 2010, the company reported GAAP net income of $87,8 million, or $0,20 per fully diluted share. This included net charges of $20,0 million, or $0,05 per fully diluted share, from special items. Also included in the operating expenses during the third quarter of 2010 was approximately $5 million of acquisition related expenses. During the second quarter of 2010, the company reported a GAAP net income of $78,7 million, or $0,18 per fully diluted share.
austriamicrosystems reported strong revenue and earnings growth for the third quarter of 2010. Third quarter group revenues were 55,7 million Euros, up 41% from 39,5 million Euros in the same quarter of 2009 (34% in constant currency terms). Third quarter revenues increased 8% sequentially compared to the second quarter. The result from operations (EBIT) for the third quarter grew strongly to 9,2 million Euros, compared to a loss of 0,2 million Euros in the third quarter last year.
Atmel announced financial results for its third quarter ended 30 September 2010, reporting that revenues were $444,3 million, up 13% from $393,4 million in the second quarter of 2010 and up 40% from $317,7 million in the third quarter of 2009. Net income on a GAAP basis was $219,8 million or $0,47 per diluted share in the third quarter of 2010. Included in this figure was a significant tax benefit from the settlement of an IRS tax audit of $150,4 million. The third quarter net income compares with a GAAP net loss of $36,4 million or a loss of $0,08 per diluted share in the second quarter of 2010 and a net loss of $17,5 million or $0,04 per diluted share in the third quarter of 2009.
Microchip reported results for the three months ended 30 September 2010. Consolidated net sales for the company’s second quarter of fiscal 2011 were $382,3 million, up 7,0% sequentially from net sales of $357,1 million in the immediately preceding quarter, and up 68,7% from net sales of $226,7 million in the prior year’s second quarter. GAAP net income from continuing operations for the second quarter of fiscal 2011 was $104,7 million, or 55 cents per diluted share, up 14,0% from GAAP net income from continuing operations of $91,9 million, or 48 cents per diluted share, in the immediately preceding quarter, and up 135,5% from GAAP net income of $44,5 million, or 24 cents per diluted share, in the prior year’s second quarter.
Skyworks Solutions reported fourth fiscal quarter and year end 2010 results. Revenue for the quarter was $313,3 million, up 14% sequentially and 37% year-over-year. For fiscal year 2010, revenue was $1,072 billion versus $802,6 million in fiscal 2009, a 34% increase. On a GAAP basis, operating income for the fourth fiscal quarter of 2010 was $65,4 million and diluted earnings per share were $0,25. Operating income for fiscal 2010 was $199,7 million and diluted earnings per share were $0,75.
Announcing financial results for the first quarter of its fiscal year 2011, International Rectifier recorded revenue of $280,9 million, a 6,5% increase from $263,8 million in the fourth quarter of fiscal year 2010 and a 56,6% increase from $179,4 million in the first quarter of fiscal year 2010. Net income was $33,5 million, or $0,47 per fully diluted share, for the most recent quarter, compared with net income of $29 million, or $0,41 per fully diluted share, in the fourth quarter last year.
NXP Semiconductors reported the sixth consecutive quarter of growth in its third quarter of 2010. Revenue was $1 213 million, an increase of 12,6% from a year ago and an increase of 1,0% compared to the immediately prior quarter. Operating income was $130 million, or 10,7% of revenue. This compares to a loss of $129 million a year ago, or 12,0% of revenue, and an income of $93 million, or 7,7% of revenue in the prior quarter.
Maxim reported record net revenue of $626,1 million for its fiscal 2011 first quarter ended 25 September 2010, an 11% increase over the $566,0 million revenue recorded in the prior quarter. Based on GAAP, diluted earnings per share in the September quarter were $0,39. The Company’s 90 day backlog decreased by 2% to $601 million.
STMicroelectronics reported financial results for the third quarter and nine months ended 25 September 2010. Net revenues for the third quarter of 2010 totalled $2 657 million and included sales recorded by ST-Ericsson as consolidated by ST. Net revenues increased 16,8% compared to the year-ago quarter and 5% sequentially. This sequential growth was led by Greater China-South Asia and Japan-Korea with 9% and 7% growth, respectively. On a year-over-year basis, all market segments, except telecom, posted growth, with consumer increasing by 36%, automotive by 31%, industrial & other by 25%, and computer by 18%; telecom declined by 12%. Distribution increased 61%.
ARM Holdings reported IFRS revenue of £100,4 million for the third quarter of 2010, a 34% increase over the £75,2 million in the same quarter last year. Earnings per share were 1,09 pence, compared to 0,53 pence in the third quarter last year.
Companies
Broadcom has signed an agreement to acquire Percello, a privately-held company that develops system-on-a-chip (SoC) solutions for femtocells. Femtocells are small, low power cellular base stations that extend coverage indoors where signals are weak. Used primarily in residential and enterprise business settings, femtocells communicate with a service provider’s network through a broadband connection, allowing users to continue using their mobile devices without losing connectivity. According to ABI Research, the femtocell market is conservatively expected to achieve volumes of 1 million in 2010 and more than 50 million by 2015.
Industry
Worldwide sales of semiconductors were $26,5 billion in September, a gain of 2,9% from the prior month when sales were $25,8 billion, the Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) reported. Sales for the third quarter of 2010 amounted to $79,4 billion, a 6,1% increase from the previous quarter and 26,2% higher than the $62,9 billion for the like period in 2009. All monthly sales numbers represent a three-month moving average. The SIA announced that sales grew steadily in all regions through the third quarter of 2010, with strong demand in consumer and industrial electronic products. The association also released its annual forecast of global semiconductor sales for 2010 through 2012, projecting record sales of $300,5 billion in 2010, an increase of 32,8%. The forecast calls for sales to grow by 6,0% in 2011, to $318,7 billion, followed by an increase of 3,4% to $329,7 billion in 2012. The projected compound annual growth rate is estimated to be 13,4% for the period 2009 through 2012.
Technology
Scientists at the US Department of Energy’s Los Alamos National Laboratory and Brookhaven National Laboratory have fabricated transparent thin films capable of absorbing light and generating electric charge over a relatively large area. The material, described in the journal Chemistry of Materials, could be used in development of transparent solar panels, which could ultimately enable windows in a home or office to generate solar power. The new material is a semiconducting polymer spiked with fullerenes – soccer-ball-shaped, cage-like molecules composed of 60 carbon atoms. When applied to a surface under carefully controlled conditions, the material self-assembles in a repeating pattern of micron-sized hexagonal-shaped cells resembling a honeycomb. Researchers created reproducible films of up to several square millimetres in area.
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