AMD overclocks its quarterly losses

A slowdown in PC buying resulted in a sizable loss and a large decline in revenue for chipmaker Advanced Micro Devices.

AMD's revenue for the second quarter, ended June 30, came to $600 million, and the company reported a net loss of $184.9 million, or 54 cents a share. Last year, AMD reported a net profit of $17.4 million, or five cents a share, on revenue of $985 million.

AMD's PC processor sales dropped 35 percent, from $580 million to $380 million, from the same period a year ago and 44 percent from the first quarter, when PC processor revenue came to $684 million. In terms of units, PC processor shipments dropped from 8 million in the first quarter to around 6 million.

"We probably lost a couple of point in (market) share," said Hector Ruiz, AMD's chief executive officer, adding that to break even the company will have to boost revenue toward $900 million. "We don't have any sloppy businesses or old fabs we can shut down anymore. We've got to work on the top line to get to 900 million plus."

By contrast, flash memory, AMD's other principal product, grew slightly from last year because of sales of flash for high-end cell phones, the company said.

News source: ZDNet