Sawtek Announces Preliminary Financial Results Significantly Higher Than Expected for the Quarter Ended March 31, 2000
ORLANDO, Fla.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--April 5, 2000--Sawtek Inc. (Nasdaq:SAWS) today announced that its preliminary financial results for the quarter ended March 31, 2000, are significantly higher than reported for the same period last year and also significantly higher than consensus expectations.
The Company expects that its net sales for the quarter ended March 31, 2000 will be approximately $37.6 million and its diluted earnings per share will be approximately $0.29. Net sales and diluted earnings per share for the quarters ended December 31, 1999 and March 31, 1999 were $31.8 million and $0.23 per share and $23.5 million and $0.17 per share, respectively. Sawtek expects to issue a full report for the quarter ended March 31, 2000 and host a conference call with the investment community on April 12, 2000.
Net sales increased approximately 60% compared to the quarter ended March 31, 1999 and increased approximately 18% compared to the quarter ended December 31, 1999. The increase in net sales was a result of increased shipments of bandpass filters for CDMA and GSM base stations, wireless local area networks and internet infrastructure, and approximately $7.0 million of shipments of new products including SAW RF filters for CDMA phones and SAW IF filters for GSM digital wireless phones. Sawtek began shipments of SAW RF and GSM IF filters in the quarter ended December 31, 1999. Diluted earnings per share increased from $0.17 per share for the quarter ended March 31, 1999 to $0.29 for the current quarter, an increase of 71%, due to higher net sales and a higher than expected gross profit margin.
Gary A. Monetti, Chief Executive Officer, stated, "The dramatic increase in net sales and earnings per share is a direct result of the broadening of our product line and the dedicated effort of all of our employees to successfully launch new products while maintaining dominance in our core markets and our history of high gross profit margins. I believe that SAW-based products will be used in significantly higher volumes and in ever-expanded roles in wireless communication and other applications, which should help Sawtek to continue to grow and prosper."
Mr. Monetti further stated, "We decided to deviate from our normal practice and pre-announce net sales and earnings results at this time because our financial performance far exceeded last year's results and expectations. As a normal practice, investors should not expect us to pre-announce our results in the future."
Sawtek designs, develops, manufacturers and markets a broad range of electronic signal processing components based on surface acoustic wave, or SAW, technology primarily for use in the wireless communications industry. Our primary products are custom-designed, high performance bandpass filters, resonators, delay lines, oscillators and SAW-based subsystems. These products are used in a variety of microwave and RF systems, such as CDMA and GSM digital wireless communications systems, digital microwave radios, wireless local area networks, cable television equipment, Internet infrastructure, various defense and satellite systems, and chemical sensors.
Forward-looking statements in this release are made pursuant to the Safe Harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Act of 1995. Investors are cautioned that forward-looking statements such as statements of the Company's plans, objectives, expectations and intentions involve risks and uncertainties. The cautionary statements made in this release should be read as being applicable to all related statements wherever they appear. Statements containing terms such as "believes", "does not believe", "no reason to believe", "expects", "plans", "intends", "estimates", or "anticipates", are considered to contain uncertainty and are forward-looking statements. The Company's actual results could differ materially from those discussed. Factors that could contribute to such differences include the following: a decline in either the growth of wireless communications or the acceptance of CDMA technology; our ability to successfully develop and bring new products to market, particularly RF filters; our ability to successfully increase production capacity; competitive products or technologies that could reduce demand for our products such as direct conversion or digital filtering technology; our dependence on a limited number of suppliers for certain key raw materials; risks associated with international sales; our dependence on a few large customers; declining selling prices for some of our key products; decreased manufacturing yields; cancellation of purchase orders by our customers; our inability to protect our intellectual property or if we infringe on the intellectual property of others; increased competition from other SAW suppliers; risks associated with our Costa Rican operations; risk of natural disasters; and other risks discussed in our SEC filings including Form 10K, Form 10Q, and Form S-3A filed on January 24, 2000.
A reader of this release should understand that it is not possible to predict or identify all such risk factors. Consequently, the reader should not consider this list to be a complete statement of all potential risks or uncertainties. We do not assume the obligation to update any forward-looking statement.
CONTACT:
Sawtek Inc., Orlando
Ray Link, Sr. Vice President-Finance
Tel: 407/884-3344
Fax: 407/886-7061
E-mail:rl@sawtek.com
KEYWORD: FLORIDA
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