Programmable logic device (PLD) maker Altera Corp. reported revenues of $499.6 million in the third quarter, up 2 percent sequentially and up 12 percent from the same quarter one year ago.
However, the company warned that the fourth quarter will see a revenue decline from 2 percent to 6 percent mainly due to softness the San Jose, CA-based company is seeing in the telecom and wireless markets. The softness is mainly coming in the telecom region as wireless is expected to be flat sequentially for Altera, which is stronger than it originally anticipated.
In fact, John Daane, president and CEO of Altera, said during the company’s earnings conference call that wireless being flat was actually a positive step as several months ago Altera was expecting a decline in that space during the fourth quarter.
“Our third quarter growth was driven by higher than expected revenue in the computer, consumer, networking and telecom markets,” Daane said. “Wireless had a minor decline in the quarter. In the fourth quarter, computer systems should again grow as we continue to lead in the server acceleration market.”
Ronald J. Pasek, senior VP of finance and CFO of Altera, said in the conference call that 28nm revenue approached $100 million during the quarter, a 30 percent sequential growth rate. “Which indicates Q3 was another quarter of 28nm share gains,” Pasek said. Altera’s 28nm products represented more than 40 percent of its product line and 28nm will continue to ramp in the fourth quarter. New products grew 9 percent sequentially and 45 percent year-over-year representing 56 percent of total revenues, Pasek said.
During the third quarter, Altera has a number of introductions and partnerships including:
The release of early access design software for Stratix 10 field programmable gate arrays (FPGAs) and system-on-chips (SoCs), which will be used in conjunction with 14nm FPGAs.
Altera and Baidu signed an agreement to use FPGAs and convolutional neural network (CNN) algorithms for deep learning applications.
Altera signed an agreement with China Mobile Research Institute (CMRI) to research and prototype next-generation green wireless network offerings.
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