Qualcomm CEO Cristiano Amon speaks at the Computex Forum in Taipei, Taiwan, June 3, 2024.
Wang An | Reuters
Qualcomm Fourth-quarter earnings reported Wednesday beat Wall Street expectations for earnings and revenue, and the company expects a strong December quarter.
The stock rose 10% in after-hours trading.
Here’s how the company performed in the quarter ended Sept. 29 versus Refinitiv consensus estimates:
- Earnings per share: $2.69, adjusted estimate of $2.56
- income: US$10.24 billion, expected to be US$9.9 billion
Qualcomm said it expected revenue in the range of $10.5 billion to $11.3 billion for the quarter, with the midpoint of that range beating LSEG’s consensus estimate of $10.59 billion.
The company reported net income of $2.92 billion, or $2.59 a share, up from $1.49 billion, or $1.23 a share, last year. Qualcomm announced total revenue of US$33.19 billion in fiscal 2024, a 9% increase from 2023.
Qualcomm’s fortunes have historically been closely tied to the smartphone industry, with the company supplying handset makers with a range of chips, including system-on-chips, modems and antennas. The company makes chips that are at the heart of most high-end Android devices, as well as many low-end phones. Qualcomm also sells modems and related chips to: apple Last year, its 5G chip contract was valid until 2026.
Qualcomm reported mobile phone chip sales rose 12% to $6.1 billion, in line with FactSet estimates. Qualcomm launched a 2025 high-end chip called Snapdragon 8 Elite in October.
Under Chief Executive Cristiano Amon, the company has moved away from being a supplier of smartphones and instead has invested heavily in bringing in and investing in the production of chips used in personal computers, cars and industrial machines.
Qualcomm has also worked hard to establish itself as a leader in artificial intelligence, developing smartphone chips with dedicated parts for machine learning since 2017. NVIDIAthe company does not produce graphics processors used in data centers and used in large-scale artificial intelligence programs such as OpenAI’s ChatGPT.
Automotive business sales increased 86% year-on-year to $899 million. Qualcomm said it has billions of dollars of business with automakers in products currently under development and highlighted that this was its fifth consecutive quarter of growth.
The company’s “Internet of Things” business includes both industrial chips and IoT chips Yuan Suitable for Quest mobile phones and Ray-Ban smart glasses. It also includes a new business selling laptop chips Microsoft Windows. The division reported revenue of $1.68 billion, up 22% from the same period last year.
Sales of Qualcomm’s chip business, which includes mobile phones, cars and other chips (collectively known as QCT), rose 18% to $7.37 billion in the quarter.
The company’s profitable technology licensing business, QTL, reported revenue of $1.52 billion, a 21% increase from the same period last year.
Qualcomm said its board of directors has approved an additional $15 billion in repurchases. In the fourth quarter, the company repurchased $1.3 billion worth of stock and paid $947 million in dividends.
watch: CNBC’s full interview with Qualcomm CEO Cristiano Amon
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