Austria Microsystems posts a yearly revenue decline of 4.7% with a bad 4Q08

Austria Microsystems Group revenues for fiscal year 2008 reached EUR 184.7 million, 4.7% below the previous year's revenues. On a constant currency basis, full year revenues decreased by only 2.2% compared to the previous year. Revenues for the fourth quarter 2008 were EUR 43.2 million, 27.4% lower than the EUR 59.5 million recorded in the same quarter 2007. On a constant currency basis, revenues for the fourth quarter decreased by 29.7% compared to the same quarter 2007.

Gross margin for the full year 2008 exceeded 50% again at 50.6%, slightly above the previous year's 50.4%. Full year gross margin remained strong despite a disappointing revenue development given active cost management, a full natural hedge in the production costs and positive efficiency effects. Gross margin was 49.3% in the fourth quarter 2008 compared to 52.2% in the same period 2007, mainly as a result of lower revenues in an increasingly challenging environment.

Austria Microsystems is an analog semiconductor specialist, targeting all key areas of precision analog applications. Here is what Austria Micro says about the performance of its various semiconductor products in different applications areas.

Segment wise and application wise highlights

In Communications, Austria Microsystems saw growth particularly in lighting management applications for handsets and other mobile devices. Austria Microsystems continued to serve Top 5 handset manufacturers with lighting and power management ICs in significant volumes, adding a leading Asian mobile phone vendor to its customer base last year. New products were introduced for LED LCD backlighting and advanced noise cancellation for handsets, and innovative digital camera modules using austriamicrosystems products are being industrialized. MEMS microphone ICs grew strongly as this microphone technology quickly penetrates the global handset and also notebook market.

Industry & Medical was again successful with magnetic encoders and specialized sensor interfaces as well as industrial control products even though the first negative effects from the weak economic situation started to become evident towards year-end. Magnetic encoders continued to show attractive growth, additional products including linear encoders were introduced and new applications opened up for the future. The new RFID reader IC product line met with success in the marketplace, first end products became available last year. Business in medical imaging which comprises digital X-ray, CT and ultrasound sensor interfaces for leading global OEMs continued to increase in 2008.

Automotive showed a positive development for nine months, but was negatively impacted by the sharp automotive industry downturn towards year-end. Still, austriamicrosystems' customers continued development efforts on next generation technologies where austriamicrosystems offers innovative solutions in areas such as FlexRay data bus, position measurement and battery management.