DailyTech - AMD Posts Q3 Loss Smaller than Analysts Expected

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Hardware AMD Posts Q3 Loss Smaller than Analysts Expected
Shane McGlaun (Blog) - October 16, 2009 9:00 AM

26 comment(s) - last by GodisanAtheist.. on Oct 21 at 2:03 PM

(Source: Wikimedia Commons/Radekk)

AMD is optimistic for Q4 and 2010

Intel is by far the largest chipmaker in the world with AMD trailing in a distant second place. AMD announced its Q3 financials this week and again posted a significant loss for Q3 2009. However, despite the loss, executives believe that AMD is poised for a turnaround.

AMD's Q3 ended on September 26 and analysts expected the company to post a loss of about 42 cents per share with revenue of $1.26 billion. AMD surprised analysts by posting a smaller loss than expected. AMD posted a loss of $128 million or 18 cents per share on $1.39 million in revenue.

AMD CEO Dirk Meyer also said during a conference call to present the Q3 results that he expects consumers to start buying PCs again in Q4 and that businesses are expected to start refreshing their machines as well. Meyer said, "We are seeing continued recovery in both Europe and North America. It also appears that the commercial IT market is positioned to improve next year."

Meyer also said that AMD is continuing to cut costs and shift its manufacturing process to 45nm parts, which can be built for much lower cost.

AMD is expecting a strong Q4 with Windows 7 debuting and several new laptop platforms aimed at consumers. The new AMD platforms include Tigris for the mainstream notebook market and Congo for the thin and light market. AMD also expects good things from its new ATI HD 5000 series video cards that offer support for DirectX 11 at low entry prices.

AMD is also expecting a larger corporate refresh for computers and servers in early 2010, so it is positive overall on the outlook for the company. The chipmaker expects its new six-core Opteron parts to be popular in the server market.

Meyer said, "We are well-positioned relative to the extent that [the] commercial IT sector regains strength."

AMD rival Intel posted Q3 numbers earlier this week to the tune of $1.9 billion in profit on $9.39 billion in revenue.

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I think he's right

By 3minence on 10/16/2009 9:38:33 AM , Rating: 5

I agree that things are about to get better. A lot of people I've talked to who were very anti-Vista are very eager about Win7. I'm hoping this creates a perfect storm.

1. Windows 7 has very good reviews and has generated a lot of excitement.

2. DirectX 11 is riding on Win7s coattails and has also generated some enthusiasm.

3. The console market is saturated and people are starting to look for better games then consoles can give them.

4. People are tired of the recession and want to buy some cool new toys.

I could be way off but I'm hoping things do get better.

RE: I think he's right

By jonmcc33 on 10/16/2009 10:04:22 AM , Rating: 3

Well, the launch of the 5800 and 5700 series graphics cards might help. Those things are selling out everywhere. I was lucky to grab a Radeon HD 5850 before it sold out.

Combine that with the launch of Windows 7 and I think AMD should see a turnaround.

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RE: I think he's right

By Morphine06 on 10/16/2009 10:37:13 AM , Rating: 1

I agree with most of what you said, but DX11? Really?
We never saw anything remotely exciting come from DX10 and you think DX11 sparks any romance? Not a chance. (at least with the majority)

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RE: I think he's right

By ThePooBurner on 10/16/2009 11:30:55 AM , Rating: 5

quote:
I agree with most of what you said, but DX11? Really? We never saw anything remotely exciting come from DX10 and you think DX11 sparks any romance? Not a chance. (at least with the majority)

Well, the reason DX10 didn't spark anything was because of a few reasons:
1) Required vista upgrade, and no one liked vista so the install base was to small to develop for.
2) AMD was late with dx10 hardware and with how loyal the followers of discrete GPUs are it would be folly to release a game that cannot work on half the player base's computers.
3) DX9 works in vista, so why bother writing more code than is needed to get a game to play on everyones computer?

Reasons these are no longer an issue and why DX11 can be a hit:
1) vista *AND* win7 will have it. the user base is much bigger now. Lots of XP users said they would do windows 7, so devs can expect more people to have it.
2) DX10 hardware is already starting to be prevalent due to it being in the 4th generation now on both sides, so for 2 years all anyone can buy is DX10 cards. the last yeah there have been 10.1 cards. DX11 is a super set of 10.1, so most cards out there can run most of DX 11. Not to mention the new DX11 hardware that is selling like hotcakes.
3) With everyone wanting to be able to get more out of their dual and quad core chips and shed loads of ram, there is more incentive for people to leave XP and dx9 if they want to play the latest and greatest.

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RE: I think he's right

By ThePooBurner on 10/16/2009 11:37:55 AM , Rating: 1

let me also add that DX9 doesn't come installed by default on win7, so you have to go and download it. And it doesn't play as well, so devs have more reason to not just stick with dx9 since they won't be delivering the best gaming experience they can if they choose to still code for dx9 on win7.

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RE: I think he's right

By dragunover on 10/16/2009 3:35:19 PM , Rating: 2

DX9 comes with Windows 7.
It does play as well.
I'd know because I have three computers with Windows 7 on it.

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RE: I think he's right

By ThePooBurner on 10/19/2009 11:15:23 AM , Rating: 2

I am only running the RC for win7 currently, and it most assuredly did not come with DX9 installed, as some of my games wouldn't run to do missing API files requiring me to install it.

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RE: I think he's right

By bobvodka on 10/16/2009 1:05:05 PM , Rating: 2

The DX11 API also works down to DX9 hardware with profiles, including the multi-threaded rendering aspect iic; so while you can't write the code once for all paths you don't have to fork a DX9 and DX11 path in your renderer and 'optimal performance' wont be as far apart.

From a developers point of view (ie my own) this is a win.

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RE: I think he's right

By tviceman on 10/16/2009 11:45:35 AM , Rating: 2

DX10 was a flop because a very large portion of game users never upgraded from XP. I am one of those people - and I am now upgrading to win 7. With Vista and Win 7 both supporting DX11, developers should finally start jumping on board.

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RE: I think he's right

By crystal clear on 10/16/09, Rating: 0

RE: I think he's right

By Taft12 on 10/16/2009 12:21:03 PM , Rating: 5

quote:
People are tired of the recession and want to buy some cool new toys.

Only your #1 has any basis in reality, but just WTF on this man I didn't know you could get tired of a recession and conjure up money out of thin air. I must have been doing something wrong all along.

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Billion

By Trisagion on 10/16/2009 9:50:21 AM , Rating: 4

quote:
AMD posted a loss of $128 million or 18 cents per share on $1.39 million in revenue.

That would be difficult, even for AMD.

RE: Billion

By Shig on 10/16/2009 10:12:21 AM , Rating: 2

Yeah lol, had to re-read that a few times.

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RE: Billion

By JPForums on 10/19/2009 7:46:54 AM , Rating: 2

quote:

quote:
AMD posted a loss of $128 million or 18 cents per share on $1.39 million in revenue.

That would be difficult, even for AMD.

Yeah, but Intel could pull it off no problem.
FDIV bug FTW.

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SOB

By Regs on 10/16/2009 9:25:17 AM , Rating: 2

I sold my stock at 3.95 in Aug. No later than a week the damn thing doubles.

RE: SOB

By Symmetry27 on 10/16/2009 9:51:47 AM , Rating: 5

Well I should thank you then, I bought a bunch right around then. But in the future make sure your investment strategy doesn't amount to "Buy high, sell low".

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AMD Laptops?

By InternetGeek on 10/16/2009 6:29:58 PM , Rating: 2

HI guys, could anyone point me to a store a la Alienware that sells AMD laptops?

RE: AMD Laptops?

By Alexvrb on 10/17/2009 4:00:47 PM , Rating: 2

Alienware is not a store, it's a brand. Dell owns them now. If you're looking for AMD laptops (do you mean CPU only, CPU and GPU?) HP has some decent models. Their dv6z series doesn't look bad at all for the money, you can configure it with up to a 2.4Ghz ZM-87 Turion X2 Ultra (though the ZM-86 is the same clock speed and is a better buy, since the only difference is hypertransport speed), and you can add a Mobility Radeon 4650 graphics card. Option it with a 7200RPM HDD and 4+ GBs of memory, 64-bit Vista with free Win7 upgrade, and you have yourself a decent machine.

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Intel's profit margin!!!!

By Amiga500 on 10/16/09, Rating: 0

RE: Intel's profit margin!!!!

By StraightCashHomey on 10/18/2009 10:38:45 AM , Rating: 1

If Intel lowered their prices any more, it might just kill off AMD. Then what?

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RE: Intel's profit margin!!!!

By GodisanAtheist on 10/21/2009 2:03:58 PM , Rating: 2

We'd all be really screwed.

I mean, really, really screwed.

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I'm excited for AMD

By rudolphna on 10/16/2009 8:18:44 PM , Rating: 2

I live in Saratoga County, new york. Some of you may or may not know that AMD/GLOBAL FOUNDRIES is currently building a chip Fab facility here in Malta, New York. I literally live 15 minutes away from the site where the facility is being built. The entire capital district, and Saratoga Cty in particular are very excited. It represents not only a source of major tax income in the future, but a source of up to 2,000 jobs in the next several years. Go AMD!

You have to be an idiot to believe their optimism

By crystal clear on 10/16/09, Rating: -1

RE: You have to be an idiot to believe their optimism

By HrilL on 10/16/2009 3:11:24 PM , Rating: 1

Yet they have the best video cards on the market that are still selling like hot cakes. AMD hasn't had a new Laptop platform in 2+ years I believe. Laptop sales are taking over the PC market so once they release a new updated platform they should see sales pickup in that market. With a lot of companies wanting to consolidate servers to save costs the new 6-core CPU are one of the best ways to do that. Someone could get a dual 6 core CPU server and replace 6 older dual opteron servers. I see the market improving for AMD.

Wish I had the money when their stock was $2 I said I was going to get some but losing my job didn't allow me to make that move and clearly it would have been one that would pay off.

AMD also hasn't released a new architecture in a long time and they may have something competitive on the high end soon.

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RE: You have to be an idiot to believe their optimism

By Iketh on 10/18/2009 4:54:09 PM , Rating: 2

neither one of you should be posting...

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RE: You have to be an idiot to believe their optimism

By thelostjs on 10/19/2009 12:07:55 PM , Rating: 2

this just in, intel's 2010 q3 nubers leaked! $60.9 billion in profit on $9.39 trillion in revenue. in other news, amd has tanked due to consumer ignorance.

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