Infineon sales, profits jump in Q4

LONDON – Infineon's financial results for the fourth quarter of the 2010 financial year came in ahead of expectations and produced jumps in revenue and profit for both the quarter and the year.

Infineon Technologies AG (Munich, Germany) made a net income of 274 million euro (about $370 million) on total sales revenue of 1.4 billion euro (about $1.9 billion) in the fourth quarter, which ended Sept. 30, 2010. The total sales revenue was up 64 percent compared with the same quarter a year before.

For the full year Infineon achieved sales of 4,585 million euro (about $6.24 billion), up 51 percent on the 3,027 million euro (about $4.12 billion) revenue achieved in the previous financial year. The company swung to an annual net profit of 635 million euro (about $865 million) compared with a loss of 167 million euro (about $225 million) in the previous financial year.

Infineon said it expects revenues for its first quarter of the 2011 financial year to be flat to down slightly compared to the fourth quarter of the 2010 fiscal year, depending on the foreign exchange rate environment and in particular on the development of the exchange rate of the U.S. dollar against the euro. For the next financial year Infineon is looking to grow towards a 10 percent revenue growth.

As Infineon plans to sell off its wireless mobile phone business to Intel, the company now reports this part of the business as a discontinued operation.