The Sunnyvale, California-based chip unveiled sales of $645.3m, up 7.5% on the year. Operating loss was $123.5m, compared to last year’s $296.7m loss. Net loss was $140.1m, compared to a loss of $184.9m a year ago.
The figures beat the $625m revenue target the company forecast last month, when it blamed the SARS outbreak for a slowdown in PC and handset sales. However, revenue was still way off the $715m it had originally forecast back in April.
The company said it had seen a pickup at the retail end of the business towards the end of the quarter, and that this appeared to have continued into the second half.
AMD has been working hard to lower its break-even point to below $800m, and said it had driven this to around $770m in the second quarter.
From the beginning of the third quarter, AMD has taken a majority share in the FASL flash memory joint venture with Fujitsu. This will mean AMD’s operating costs, and hence its effective break-even point, increase to $1bn.
However, the vendor said it now had more freedom to drive sales from this operation, and to derive synergies, and therefore reduce costs.
For the third quarter, AMD expects sales to increase, due to seasonality, increased shipments of its recently launched Opteron line, and the launch in September of its Athlon 64 line. It expects flash memory sales to increase, driven in part by the recovery of the Asian markets. In addition, the consolidation of the FASL operation will immediately add $180m of revenues to its flash business.
For the year to date, sales were down 9% to $1.4bn. Net loss was $286.5m, compared to a loss of $194m last year.
Source: Computerwire
