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Technology Stocks : Applied Materials No-Politics Thread (AMAT) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Proud_Infidel who wrote (4177)	11/22/2002 11:11:50 PM
From: Proud_Infidel	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 25522

Graphics chip demand strong amid PC slump-Nvidia Friday November 22, 8:21 pm ET By Ben Berkowitz SANTA CLARA, Calif., Nov 22 (Reuters) - Overall demand for personal computers is flat but sales of top-end processors, used for graphics-hungry applications such as video games are mostly weathering the downturn, the chief financial officer of Nvidia Corp. (NasdaqNM:NVDA - News) said on Friday. Nvidia, which was the best-performing stock on the S&P 500 in 2001, has seen its shares fall sharply this year, battered by a regulatory probe of accounting practices, weak results in its July quarter and a pricing and production dispute with major customer Microsoft Corp. (NasdaqNM:MSFT - News) But the Santa Clara, California-based company expects that with its newest chip family, which it unveiled this week, it will regain its once-dominant position at the high end of the graphics processor market by the spring. In an interview with Reuters at Nvidia's headquarters, Chief Financial Officer Marv Burkett said the PC market was shaping up in line with the outlook microprocessor giant Intel Corp. (NasdaqNM:INTC - News) gave in October when it said that the slumping sector remained weak heading into the crucial holiday season. "I don't have any reason to believe that's wrong," Burkett said. "I don't think anybody feels like it's a robust corporate environment." But at the same time, Burkett said demand was "very good" for Nvidia's GeForce 4 Ti 4200 and 4600 graphics processors, powerful chips often found on add-in graphics cards popular with PC gaming and media enthusiasts. Earlier on Friday, brokerage UBS Warburg downgraded Nvidia shares to "reduce" from "hold" on concerns about heavy competition and pricing pressures on the company's chips. Burkett also said there was no new news on the SEC investigation, which the company has said centers around the timing of product costs it recorded in fiscal 2001 and the recording of reserves in fiscal 2000 and 2001. Earlier this week, at the Comdex technology trade show in Las Vegas, Nvidia unveiled its latest family of graphics chips, the GeForce FX line, which had been known by the code name NV30. Those chips are manufactured for Nvidia by Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. Ltd. (Taiwan:2330.TW - News), which counts Nvidia as its largest customer. Analysts have long speculated that Nvidia, which has no chip fabrication plants of its own, might someday opt to diversify by outsourcing some production to International Business Machines. (NYSE:IBM - News) "We're very happy with TSMC," said Burkett. Burkett also acknowledged that it was possible the company might some day do some foundry business with companies other than the Taiwanese chip giant. Shares in Nvidia closed off 42 cents at $15.72 on Friday after being as high as $72.66 and as low as $7.20 a share earlier this year. But Burkett said shareholders, who recognize that the whole market for technology shares has been battered, have been content with the company's strategy. "I think it's a very, very understanding investor these days," he said.