Chipmaker Micron's profit, revenue beat estimates

By Anya George Tharakan

(Reuters) - Memory chipmaker Micron Technology Inc (NASDAQ: MU) reported a lower-than-expected fall in quarterly revenue, welcome relief for an industry that has been battered by a drop in demand and prices.

The company's shares rose as much 8.3 percent at $15.99 in after-hours trading.

"You're getting a little bit of a relief rally here, because it wasn't even worse than expectations," Wedbush Securities analyst Betsy Van Hees said.

Van Hees said the question really is demand and how strong demand will be across all end-markets, not just PCs.

Micron said on Thursday forecast revenue of $3.35 billion-$3.6 billion for the current quarter, well below analysts' average expectation of $3.73 billion.

The company, which makes both dynamic random access memory (DRAM)and NAND flash memory chips, reported a 14.8 percent fall in revenue to $3.60 billion in the fourth quarter, compared with a year earlier.

The results beat the average analyst estimate of $3.55 billion, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.

NAND flash memory chips are widely used in smartphones, cameras and other mobile devices to store music, pictures and other data. DRAM chips are mostly used in personal computers.

Micron said it expects the demand environment to stabilize and improve through calendar 2016.

Gartner last month warned of a steeper drop in global PC shipments in 2015. The research firm said global PC sales would fall 7.3 percent this year, compared with its previous estimate of a 4.5 percent decline.

Micron said net income attributable to the company fell 59 percent to $471 million, or 42 cents per share, in the quarter ended Sept. 3. (http://1.usa.gov/1ML4B0T)

Excluding items, the company earned 37 cents per share, trumping analysts' estimates of 32 cents per share.

Micron is being pursued by China's state-backed Tsinghua Unigroup Ltd, according to reports.

Tsinghua, whose unit bought a 15 percent stake in Western Digital Corp (NASDAQ: WDC) for $3.8 billion on Wednesday, has offered $23 billion for Micron, but the plan has been clouded by U.S. security concerns.

Shares of Micron, which competes with SanDisk Corp (NASDAQ: SNDK) and SK Hynix Inc <000660.KS>, have fallen more than 57 percent this year.

(Reporting by Anya George Tharakan in Bengaluru)

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