On the heels of Intel¡¯s lower than expected earnings announcement, its smaller rival AMD issued its own results that revealed market share gains and a big jump in revenues ¨C 45 percent year over year.

AMD reported net income of $96 million or 21 cents per share on sales of $1.84 billion for Q4.  That compares to a net loss of $30 million or 8 cents per share on sales of $1.26 billion during the same period a year ago, and net income of $76 million or 18 cents per share on sales of $1.52 billion for Q3.

The Sunnyvale, Calif.-based company¡¯s Q4 results include a non-cash charge of $110 million, or $0.24 per share, associated with the reduction of AMD's ownership in Spansion to 37.9 percent as a result of Spansion's IPO. Excluding this charge, AMD achieved net income of $205 million, or 45 cents per share.

"AMD's growth rate increased in the fourth quarter resulting in continued market share gains across server, desktop and mobile product lines," said Robert Rivet, AMD's CFO, in a statement. "In addition to solid execution against our product and technology strategies, we made significant strides in the quarter to improve our balance sheet by significantly reducing our debt and increasing our cash and short-term investment balance to $1.8 billion."

For the year AMD¡¯s sales climbed to $5.85 billion, a 17 percent increase from 2004. Fiscal year 2005 net income was $165 million, or 40 cents per share

Excluding the results of the Memory Products Group segment, AMD saw sales of $3.94 billion for the year ended, an increase of 48 percent from 2004, and operating income of $543 million for 2005. Comparable sales in 2004 were $2.66 billion, resulting in operating income of $187 million.

Looking forward, AMD expects Q1 sales to be flat to slightly down seasonally from the Q4.  If achieved, the company said, it would approach a 70 percent increase from comparable sales in the first quarter of 2005.

Shares of rival processor maker Intel fell 11 percent on Wednesday, following the company¡¯s earnings announcement on Tuesday afternoon. Intel missed analysts¡¯ expectations, blaming a chipset shortage, slower than expected desktop PC sales and lower prices for results that disappointed Wall Street.

By: DocMemory
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