AMD posts strong Q4, claims market share gains

AMD today posted a profit of $96 million on revenues of $1.84 billion for the fourth quarter of 2005. This compares to a loss of $30 million and sales of $1.26 billion in Q4 of 2004. For the year, revenues climbed 17% from 5.0 billion to $5.85 billion, net income rose from $91 million in 2004 to $165 million in 2005.

Q4 revenues include sales generated from its Spansion memory group, which the company spun off in December. Fourth quarter revenues were $1.35 billion - up 78% from comparable sales of $760 million in Q4 2004.

"AMD’s growth rate increased in the fourth quarter resulting in continued market share gains across server, desktop and mobile product lines," said Robert Rivet, chief financial officer at AMD.

The firm’s Computation Product Group (CPG) - responsible for microprocessors - achieved sales of $1.31 billion, which translates into a 79% increase over the same period in 2004. According to AMD, fourth quarters ales growth was driven by "an increase in units and average selling price (ASP), increased demand from AMD’s largest global customers, and an acceleration of AMD’s commercial server and client businesses."

The company stated that climbing demand for its mobile Turion 64 processors as well as dual-core server and desktop CPUs contributed to the growth.

AMD shares gained $3.43 or 10.04% in Wednesday trading and gained an additional $1.29 in early post-day trading.