Southern Africa
Technology group IST has posted a 480% improvement in earnings at the halfway mark as the turnaround process it initiated last year continued to pay dividends. The company said interim results for the six months to August showed an increase in turnover of 46% to R136m, operating profit up 149% at R15,1m and net profit grew by 579% to R9,5m. Chief Executive Harry Coetzee said all the group's divisions had contributed to this strong performance over a period characterised by a high level of operational activity. Significant developments during the period included the extension by Telkom of the contract for digital loop carriers and by Eskom of the national contract for remote terminal units and substation control systems. In addition, IST said it had been appointed as turnkey contractor for the extension of the compressed air plant at the Mozal aluminium smelter. Coetzee noted that IST's Electronics group currently had tenders worth more than R1 bn under adjudication while its Mechanical Group had submitted tenders valued in excess of R100m.
Eskom Enterprises, the nonregulated arm of power utility Eskom has announced that it has chosen Siemens' Information and Communications Group (I and C) as its technology partner for implementation of its fibre-optic network infrastructure in preparation of participation in South Africa's Second National Operator (SNO) roll-out. In terms of the agreement, Siemens will be responsible for the supply, installation, commissioning and operations of a turnkey telecommunications solution for the SNO. Chief Operating Officer of Siemens Telecommunications, Pete da Silva, said the rollout of the project would begin in January 2002, with live switch-on planned for the end of April 2002.
Africa has passed the 4 million mark for Internet users, says South African Internet research analyst Mike Jensen in a new report. The report estimates are that there are now more than 1,3 million subscribers in Africa, but since each computer with an Internet or e-mail connection usually supports a range of three to five users, this would put the current estimate of the number of African Internet users at somewhere around 4 million. About 1,5 million of these are outside South Africa, according to the report.
Spescom has been awarded Avaya Gold business partner status in the sub-Saharan region. Spescom says it has had a lengthy involvement with Avaya, stretching back to 1995, when Spescom was the sole SA distributor of AT&T technology. This connection continued when Lucent Technologies took over from AT&T, eventually creating the new company Avaya in October 2000. Spescom said that following the Avaya restructuring, the Gold Certification was awarded to Spescom DataFusion, making it the first company in Africa to achieve this.
Maxtor has concluded a sole distribution agreement with SA computer components and peripherals distributor, Rectron, who will market Maxtor's line-up of storage products for desktop computers, network storage, high-performance servers, IEEE 1394 external storage devices and consumer electronics.
Fibre-optic cable distributor Fibreplus has been appointed distributor for cable and network equipment company, Fluke Networks.
Arrow Altech and Components & System Design (CSD) have signed a sub-distribution agreement which provides CSD with exclusive buying and selling rights to the ST Microelectronics (STM) range of PSD devices (formerly Waferscale) and the embedded STM microcontrollers in South Africa.
Shorrock Automation has moved into newly built premises in Irene, Centurion. The new offices are situated at 44 Sovereign Drive, Route 21, Corporate Park, Irene Ext. 30, Centurion, Pretoria. Tel: (012) 345 4449, fax: (012) 345 5145.
Overseas
Business
Arrow Electronics has reported a net loss of $159,1m, including the impact of the special charges, on sales of $2,2 bn in the third quarter, compared with net income of $101,9m on sales of $3,3 bn for the prior year. Excluding the impact special charges, Arrow had a net loss of $14 m. 'The significant actions we have taken during the quarter should enable us to be modestly profitable at current sales and margin levels without sacrificing our future,' said Francis M. Scricco, President and CEO of Arrow. 'Market conditions are difficult, and visibility remains clouded at best.' Arrow said that worldwide components revenue decreased 43% from last year's third quarter to $1,5 bn, primarily due to the depressed demand from large telecommunications and networking customers and the contract manufacturers that serve them. The company said that the pace of the sales decline on a sequential quarter basis slowed in its third quarter and that sequential sales in the company's core OEM businesses in both North America and Asia/Pacific were in the low single digits.
Avnet posted a net loss of $19,2m for the fiscal first quarter of 2002, compared with net income of $82,4m for the year-ago quarter. Avnet's sales for the quarter ended September 28 were $2,2 bn, compared with $3,2 bn in the first quarter of last year. 'We are obviously disappointed with our absolute results for the quarter, which reflect the extremely difficult environment in which we are operating,' said Roy Vallee, Avnet's chairman and CEO. 'Although our two computer businesses, computer marketing (CM) and applied computing (AC), have been negatively impacted by the business environment, it is our electronics marketing (EM) business that has been most severely affected by this downturn.' Avnet's EM business reported sales $1,2bn, down 44% from last year's $2,2bn and down 20% on a sequential basis.
Intel has announced that its third quarter revenue of $6,5 bn, was down 25% from the third quarter of 2000 and up 3% sequentially. For the third quarter, net income excluding acquisition-related costs was $655m, down 77% from the third quarter of 2000 and 23% sequentially. Including acquisition-related costs, Intel said third quarter net income was $106m, down 96% from the third quarter of 2000 and 46% sequentially. 'Intel delivered solid third quarter results in a turbulent environment, with revenue and microprocessor units up from the second quarter,' stated CEO Craig Barrett. 'While economic conditions worldwide remain weak, we continue to strengthen our competitive position and expect to see moderate unit growth in microprocessors and flash memory in the fourth quarter.'
Agere Systems reported revenues fell 35% sequentially to $600m in the company's fiscal fourth quarter, ended 30 September, compared to $927m in the prior quarter. Agere's IC revenues dropped 28% to $469m from $650m in the prior quarter, while optoelectronics sales fell 53% to $131m from $277m. Including restructuring charges and other one-time items, Agere's net loss totalled $3,35 bn in the just-ended quarter. Agere, formerly Lucent Microelectronics, said that due to lowering costs and expenses, as well as reducing capital expenditures, it exited fiscal 2001 with more than $3 bn in cash.
Royal Philips Electronics has reported its third quarter net income amounted to a loss of $725m, slightly higher than the second quarter's loss of about $700m. Commenting on the results, Gerard Kleisterlee, CEO of Royal Philips Electronics, said: 'The electronics parts of our company continue to suffer heavily from continued poor market conditions in telecom and PC-related businesses, as do our major unconsolidated companies. Consumer confidence in all major markets has been slipping this year, a trend that has accelerated after the events of 11 September.' In the consumer electronics division, sales were down 18% from the same period last year to about $2,36 bn. Semiconductor sales, at about $816m for the quarter, were 43% lower than last year, while loss for the division was about $264m compared with a profit of about $339m a year earlier. Philips said that unless there was a change in economic conditions, for the fourth quarter it expects to report a break-even operating income before charges, and a positive cash flow from operations.
Fairchild Semiconductor has reported a 12,6% sequential drop in revenues to $325,4m in the third quarter from $372,4m in Q2. Fairchild posted a net loss of $19,1m, including charges for restructuring, compared to a net loss of $8,0m in the second quarter. A year ago in the third quarter, Fairchild had revenues of $476,0m and a net income of $69,7m. However, Kirk Pond, CEO of Fairchild said that product bookings grew 23% in the third quarter over the prior period, pushing the company's book-to-bill ratio higher than 1:1.
In releasing third-quarter results, Samsung Electronics reported its semiconductor division posted an operating loss of $292m on sales of $1,24 bn, its first loss since 1987. Samsung's semiconductor revenues were 26% lower than sales in Q2, primarily due to falling DRAM prices.
VIA Technologies, Taiwan, has announced financial results for the third quarter of 2001. Net sales reached NT$7905m, and income before tax totalled NT$880m. Compared to the same period for the prior year, 2001 third quarter net sales decreased by 22,2% and income before tax by 64,2%. The company recently posted revised forecasts for 2001 to reflect the economic slowdown in the US and Japanese markets and the resulting sharp downturn in the global PC industry. However, the Q3 sales and income results beat these forecasts.
Companies
Toshiba and Matsushita Electric Industrial are merging their liquid-crystal display (LCD) and next-generation display businesses in a joint venture company. Toshiba will own 60% of the new company and Matsushita 40%. It is expected to be launched in April 2002.
Intersil has just signed an agreement with China's largest PC manufacturer, Legend Holdings for a joint research and development programme to use Intersil's PRISM WLAN technology in Legend's range notebook PCs. At the same time, Intersil signed a strategic alliance with Taiwanese notebook manufacturer, Quanta Computer, to develop new wireless enabled notebook computers, Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs) and other small handheld wireless computing devices.
Integrated Device Technology has announced it is to partner with two players in the network-processing arena. IDT has formed an alliance with Solidum Systems of Ottawa to help designers use the company's classification processor with its CAM-based co-processors in next-generation networking systems. IDT also announced a partnership with Xelerated Packet Devices, Stockholm, to support design activities based on its network processors.
Industry Research group Forward Concepts has, in a revised forecast, predicted that digital signal processor (DSP) revenues will fall 30% this year from sales in 2000. Programmable DSP chip sales are expected to drop from $6,1 bn in 2000 to $4,3 bn in 2001. Forward Concepts also lowered its growth outlook for programmable DSPs to a 32% increase in 2002 from a previous projection of 35%, putting DSP revenues at $5,7 bn next year.
The worldwide PC market further deteriorated in the third quarter of 2001 with shipments declining by 13,7% over the same quarter a year ago and by 0,8% sequentially. This compares to an average sequential growth for the quarter of 15% over the past several years. Blaming continuing depressed worldwide economic conditions, IDC research said that the 11 September attacks and subsequent events further accentuated an already difficult economic environment. Both consumer and commercial confidence is at an all-time low.
IC Insights has lowered its worldwide chip forecast for 2002, and projected that capital expenditures would fall another 25% next year over 2001. The analyst firm originally projected that the worldwide semiconductor revenues would grow by 16% in 2002 over 2001, but now projects the IC market will only grow by 1% next year over 2001.
ElectroTextiles, a UK-based company that develops and licenses soft interfacing technology, has raised £6m in a second stage funding round from a consortium comprising venture capitalists and corporate partners. The company also announced it is changing its name to ElekSen, which it says more accurately reflects the core switching and sensing activity of the business. ElekSen has developed a sensing technology platform, called ElekTex, which combines a soft, conformable fabric interface with firmware and software, to create soft, lightweight interfaces for consumer electronics products, such as keyboards for mobile phones and handheld computers.
Intel has closed its Connected Products Division due to lack of profitability. However, Intel said this will not affect its other OEM products, such as its wireless LAN devices sold under its communications division. Intel's consumer products included PC cameras, digital audio players, and children's toys. Intel will discontinue manufacturing the products but will continue to sell the existing inventory.
Standard Resources has predicted that worldwide revenues for microdisplay components - such as liquid-crystal-on-silicon (LCOS) devices and other display technologies - are expected to reach $1,9 bn in 2007 from $668m in 2001.
Technology
Intel has introduced what it claims is the industry's first flash memory product built on 0,13 mm process technology. The new flash memory chip is nearly 50% smaller and consumes less power than its 0,18 mm predecessor, says the company, making it ideal for cellphones and other electronics equipment where small form factors and low power are critical requirements. The 3 V Advanced+ Boot Block flash will be available in 32- and 64 Mbit densities.
Infineon Technologies announced at Cartes 2001 show in Paris the availability of the first member of its security controller 88 family. The products are designed for multi-application chip cards used in electronic banking, mobile communications and identity authentication. Infineon said the new 88 family combines a high-performance 32 bit core architecture and an integral security concept to meet the demanding requirements of multi-application systems.
Texas Instruments claims to be the first chip supplier to offer a next-generation standard logic family that is optimised for 1,8 V systems but operational at sub-volt levels. TI's Advanced Ultra-Low Voltage CMOS (AUC) could provide significant benefits to portable consumer electronics, computing and telecom applications by operating at low power and high speed while maintaining overall system signal integrity, says TI. The family consists of Little Logic (single/dual/triple gates), octals and WideBus devices, and have an operating voltage range of 0,8 V to 2,5 V. TI has been working closely with Philips Semiconductors and IDT to develop the specifications for the new AUC family.
Alcatel Microelectronics, Brussels, has announced the release of a single chip LIN transceiver for automotive In-Vehicle-Networking (IVN) requirements. Alcatel is also helping define the standardisation of the low-cost LIN communication protocol, through its partner status in the LIN consortium. The new transceiver chip is designed to interface between a LIN protocol controller and the physical bus. Alcatel used its own I2T100 (BiMOS/CMOS/DMOS) technology to develop the device, which enables both high voltage analog circuitry and digital functionality to co-exist on the same chip.
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