Motorola, EMC and Sun Micro-systems, three former Wall Street favorites struggling to rebound from the technology recession that began in 2000, reported on Tuesday mostly encouraging results for the quarter.
For, Motorola, which sells a broad array of wireless communications and semiconductor products, and EMC, the leader in the data-storage industry, the quarter brought surging earnings and market share gains. For Sun, which primarily makes server computers that run networks, unexpectedly strong sales for the quarter -- the last in its fiscal year -- ended a dismal three-year stretch in which every quarter's sales had been lower than the quarter the previous year.
The trio, while noting that the July-to-September quarter is typically a slow one for technology sales, expressed varying degrees of optimism about the rest of this year.
Motorola reported a net loss of US$203 million or US$0.09 a share for the quarter ended July 3. The loss reflected a number of one-time tax losses and gains, including an US$898 million accounting entry related to the future tax consequences of its spinoff of Freescale Semiconductor, its semiconductor products subsidiary. Absent such adjustments, Motorola earned US$0.21 a share. Analysts had expected US$0.18 a share.
Revenue of Motorola rose 41 percent, to US$8.7 billion.
EMC said that net income in the quarter jumped to US$192.8 million, or US$0.08 a share, from US$81.7 million, or US$0.04 a share, in the second quarter of last year.
Revenue rose 33 percent, to US$1.97 billion from US$1.48 billion a year ago.
EMC's results met the consensus projections of analysts tracked by Thomson First Call.
That cast a reassuring light on a technology sector that had given investors tense moments in recent weeks after several smaller storage vendors and suppliers of components to storage systems companies had revised projected sales or earnings downward.
The strong performance underscored the success of EMC's strategy of investing heavily in expanding the range of storage software and service products it could sell along with its hardware.
Sun said that revenue for the quarter that ended June 30 was US$3.11 billion, up 4.3 percent.
While modest compared to the growth at Motorola and EMC, it was well ahead of the US$2.88 billion analysts had expected and the first time since the first three months of 2001 that sales were higher than the year-earlier quarter.
Sun said that net income was US$795 million, or US$0.24 a share, in contrast to a loss of US$1.04 billion, or US$0.32 a share, in the period a year ago. But this year's figure included US$1.6 billion from its settlement in April of litigation with Microsoft, a US$145 million charge for restructuring and other adjustments. Adjusting for special charges, Sun lost US$169 million in the quarter, or US$0.05 a share.
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