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Intel profit leaps to $3.2 billion, crushes estimates

Chipmaker posts fourth-quarter net income of $3.2 billion, up 29 percent over the same period last year. Revenue is $12.8 billion, an all-time company record, its CEO says.

Brooke Crothers Former CNET contributor
Brooke Crothers writes about mobile computer systems, including laptops, tablets, smartphones: how they define the computing experience and the hardware that makes them tick. He has served as an editor at large at CNET News and a contributing reporter to The New York Times' Bits and Technology sections. His interest in things small began when living in Tokyo in a very small apartment for a very long time.
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Brooke Crothers
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Intel posted blockbuster first-quarter net income of $3.2 billion, up 29 percent over the same period last year. Revenue came in at $12.8 billion, up 25 percent year-over-year.

Earnings per share were 56 cents (and 59 cents non-GAAP). Analysts had been expecting 46 cents a share.

In the same period last year, the chipmaker's revenue was $10.3 billion, or 43 cents per share. Last year's first-quarter profit was $2.4 billion.

"The first-quarter revenue was an all-time record for Intel fueled by double-digit annual revenue growth in every major product segment and across all geographies," Intel President and CEO Paul Otellini said in a statement. "These outstanding results, combined with our guidance for the second quarter, position us to achieve greater than 20 percent annual revenue growth."

One of the key financial indicators, gross margin, hit 62 percent, Intel said, down 1 percentage point compared to the same period last year.

For the second quarter, the company forecasts revenue of $12.4 billion plus or minus $500 million, which is also ahead of estimates.

Revenue by group:

  • Overall, Intel Architecture Group first quarter revenue was $12.2 billion, up 23 percent year over year
  • The PC Client Group had revenue of $8.6 billion, up 17 percent year over year
  • Data Center Group revenue was $2.5 billion, up 32 percent year over year.
  • IMC, formerly the Infineon wireless division, contributed $336M to the first quarter 2011 revenue.

With PC shipments approaching 400 million units this year, Otellini said that Intel's aggressive forecasts for PCs differ from market research firms, which have reduced forecasts for PCs in 2011. "Our views differ from some of theirs. Emerging markets forecasts are not well reflected [in market research firms numbers]," Otellini said.

Editor's note:This post has been revised to reflect GAAP numbers. The story was originally posted with non-GAAP numbers.