Xircom CEO sees '99 revenues at $415 mln
Monday March 1, 5:19 pm Eastern Time
ORLANDO, Fla., March 1, (Reuters) -
Xircom, a leading manufacturer of PC
cards, expects sales of $415 million in FY 1999 on the strength of its RealPort
line, chairman and CEO Dirk Gates said Monday.
Xircom reported sales of $276 million in fiscal 1998, ended last Sept. 30
The RealPort cards, which come as modems, LAN connections and
combinations of the two, do away with dongles, the proprietary cords that
connect notebook-computer cards to telephone or LAN lines.
''Dongles can cost as much as $70 to replace,'' Gates told institutional
investors at a conference hosted by Raymond James & Associates.
Gates said that companies using fleets of computer notebooks have
reported losses of 3-4 percent of the proprietary cables each month.
The RealPort cards connect directly to RJ jacks found on standard
telephone cords.
Gates said the RealPort cards represented 40 percent of the companys
fourth-quarter 1998 sales.
Unlike its competitors, Xircoms sole business is mobile networking
products. Intel acquired a 12.5 percent stake in the company in 1998.
''We've done one thing and one thing only for the last 10 years -- connect
notebooks to networks,'' Gates said. |
