UPDATE 2-Infineon reports higher Q3 sales, wireless profit
Thu Jul 16, 2009 6:23am EDT Email | Print | Share | Reprints | Single Page [-] Text [+]
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* Sales rise quarter on quarter
* Wireless unit makes first profit in years
* Shares rise 8 percent
(Adds analyst comment, details on units, updates shares)
By Georgina Prodhan
LONDON, July 16 (Reuters) - Struggling German chipmaker Infineon (IFXGn.DE) reported a quarter-on-quarter sales increase on Thursday, lifting its shares and adding to improving sector sentiment after strong results from Intel Corp (INTC.O).
In preliminary fiscal third-quarter figures released on Thursday, Infineon Technologies AG said sales in the quarter to end-June were about 845 million euros ($1.2 billion), up 13 percent from the quarter to end-March but down 18 percent from a year earlier.
The companys' wireless unit made its first profit in years, and all other units apart from automotive were also profitable.
Infineon shares, already buoyed by reports of better-than-expected personal computer sales in the quarter just ended and an upgrade from DZ Bank, were up 8.3 percent to 3.385 euros by 1000 GMT.
Analyst Harald Schitzer of DZ Bank, who earlier upgraded the shares to "buy", said the results were better than expected.
"Due to quite good forecasts from Intel and other semi producers we expect a quite confident outlook from Infineon at the end of July," he wrote in a note.
Chipmakers have endured an extended slump in their cyclical business for over a year as consumers and businesses slashed spending on computers, mobile phones and other electronics and major world markets slid into recession.
Intel, the world's biggest chipmaker, cheered investors late on Tuesday with results that beat market expectations, thanks to better demand for PCs than had been foreseen, especially in Asia.
Infineon's figures were released together with a prospectus for a 725 million euro rights issue, which confirmed U.S. activist investor Apollo Management LP may acquire just under 30 percent of the company in the process. (Reporting by Georgina Prodhan; Editing by David Holmes and Jason Neely)
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