Thursday October 26, 3:11 am Eastern Time
Intel CEO says bullish on global chip mkt
(UPDATE: Recasts, adds press conference details)
By Nam In-soo
SEOUL, Oct 26 (Reuters) - Craig Barrett, president and CEO of the world's number one chipmaker, Intel Corp (NasdaqNM:INTC - news), said on Thursday he was bullish on the global chip market, due to steady demand from makers of personal computers and mobile telephones.
``I'm pretty bullish about the global demand for semiconductors considering steady growth in the PC, networking infrastructure and wireless communications areas,'' he told a news conference.
Barrett was in Seoul for Intel Korea's e-Business Forum.
``According to forecasts, global mobile phone penetration is expected to grow to one billion handsets by 2005 from about 400 million this year,'' he said.
Intel said last week its third-quarter shipments of microprocessors, the brains of PCs which account for 80 percent of the firm's sales and virtually all its profits -- were little changed from the second quarter, as were average selling prices for each chip.
The Santa Clara, Calif.-based company said net income before acquisition-related charges rose to $2.9 billion, or 41 cents a share in the July-September quarter, from $1.90 billion, or 27 cents, a year ago.
Sales rose 19 percent to $8.73 billion from $7.33 billion, 5.2 percent higher than the second quarter.
Barrett, while refraining from giving specific figures, reiterated the company's earlier forecast that fourth-quarter revenues would rise 4 percent to 8 percent from those in the third.
Intel shares closed down 0\11 at $41\05 on Wednesday.
KOREA'S E-COMMERCE TO EXPLODE
Barrett told Korean businessmen early in the day that South Korea's Internet commerce revenue was predicted to rise 315 percent to $1.2 billion in 2000 from a year earlier.
Quoting figures from International Data Corp, he said the country's Internet commerce revenue was expected to expand further to $35 billion by 2004.
``Although the figures are from a research firm, I agree with the forecast,'' he said.
Barrett called for Korean companies to boost their business efficiency and competitiveness via the Internet.
``Korea's companies have the opportunity to lead Asia in deploying e-Business,'' he said.
``With 40 percent of the population already online and widespread availability of broadband access, Korea's businesses have the opportunity to grow their e-commerce and further accelerate Korea's Internet economy,'' he said.
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