TI Sees End to Inventory 'Overhang'
Thursday October 3, 11:56 am ET
biz.yahoo.com
BANGALORE (Reuters) - Texas Instruments Inc (NYSE:TXN - News), the world's No 1 chip maker for cellular phones, is seeing an end to an overhang in inventories, Chief Executive Officer Tom Engibous said on Thursday.
"The semiconductor industry grossly undershippped last year what actuals our customers were consuming because of the large inventory overhang they had generated in 1999 and 2000," he told a news conference in the Indian tech capital of Bangalore.
"What we have seen in our industry over the last two quarters is that the overhang in inventories pretty much has been worked through except in the wireline, telecom area."
"Going forward, we have to expect that semiconductor growth will more reflect the growth rate of end-use equipment," said Engibous, who is also the company's chairman and president.
He did not provide any projections for earnings or revenue growth.
Last week, William Aylesworth, the company's chief financial officer, said third-quarter results were tracking expectations, with revenue forecast to grow 20 percent year-on-year.
Earnings per share is expected to be nine to 10 cents before special items, he added.
On September 4, Texas Instruments said its third-quarter outlook remained unchanged at five percent growth in revenue over the second quarter's $2.26 billion.
The Dallas-based company set up its research and development center in Bangalore in 1985, pioneering the trend of U.S. firms starting Indian technology centers.
The Indian center is one of Texas Instruments' largest technology centers outside the United States.
Engibous said the Indian center is playing a significant role in the company's global operations.
"I think it's safe to say that India is emerging as a silicon design powerhouse," he said, adding that the company had doubled employee strength in India to 1,000-plus in the past few years even as it cut staff in almost every other location last year.
Biswadip Mitra, managing director of Texas Instruments India, said the center was going to play a key role in the company's plans to make one single mobile phone chip by 2004. |
