06/24 10:50 QUALCOMM<QCOM.O>CEO says Asia problem now behind
PARIS, June 24 (Reuters) - QUALCOMM Inc <QCOM.O> chairman and chief executive Irwin
Jacobs said on Wednesday that he sees no need for further provisions for Asia risks.
"We announced that we would be taking a hit on the second and third quarter of this year on the
Asian flu, particularly what happened in Korea," he told reporters on a visit to Paris.
"I also mentioned that I thought it was roughly a two quarter phenomenon. Not that Korea and
Asia will come back in two quarters, but that other things will compensate it," he said.
QUALCOMM's financial year runs to the end of September.
"We are about to complete the third quarter and I would say we have it pretty much behind us,"
Jacobs said.
He said the planned spin-off of some $200-$300 million in assets was on track.
"We have investments in several operating companies, the small stake in Korea, a bigger one in
Chile...We got into it because of our technology and to sell equipment. But now they have become
so substantial that they are very different from the rest of our business," Jacobs said.
"We announced that we were planning to look into spinning these assets off into a separate
company. We are proceeding with plans to do that.
"Every time you are going to do these things, you run into a series of financial/SEC type questions
and we are working our way through these at the moment," Jacobs said.
QUALCOMM had $2.096 billion in sales for the year to September 30, 1997, and
Jacobs said sales this year would exceed $3 billion. |
