(Aug 12): Super Micro Computer Inc shares jumped after the company gave a revenue forecast for the current quarter that topped analysts’ estimates, a sign the booming artificial intelligence market continues to bolster sales of the company’s servers.
Revenue will be US$14.5 billion (RM59.25 billion) to US$15.5 billion in the period ending in September, the company said Tuesday in a statement. Profit, excluding some items, will be US$1.01 to US$1.10 a share. Analysts polled by Bloomberg projected sales, on average, of US$12 billion and profit of 74 cents. The outlook topped even the highest analyst revenue estimate of US$13.3 billion.
San Jose, California-based Super Micro is benefiting from surging demand for gear to train and run AI tasks. The company’s servers are fitted with the Nvidia Corp chips that have become the workhorse for the vast majority of AI data centres. Super Micro has also been working to boost margins by selling more profitable products and trimming costs.
“Combined with continued investment in technology leadership, manufacturing scale and global compliance, we are enabling customers to deploy AI infrastructure faster and more efficiently,” CEO Charles Liang said in the statement.
The shares surged as much as 18% to US$37.13 after markets opened in New York on Wednesday. The stock was already up 8% this year through Tuesday’s close.
Last month, the company’s shares rose 20% in a single day after the server maker issued preliminary fiscal fourth-quarter results saying its backlog hit a record on new orders of more than US$60 billion. The company also said margins would be better than forecast.
On Tuesday, Super Micro said revenue will be US$65 billion to US$72 billion in the fiscal year that began in July. Analysts, on average, projected US$54.4 billion.
The annual outlook “reflects strengthening AI opportunities and sales execution, with modest improvement in normalised gross margin,” Bloomberg Intelligence analyst Woo Jin Ho said in a note.
In March, US prosecutors charged Super Micro co-founder Yih-Shyan “Wally” Liaw with illegally diverting billions of dollars in Nvidia-powered servers to China, in violation of US export controls. Super Micro isn’t named as a defendant and the company has said it’s cooperating with authorities. In late June, Taiwanese prosecutors detained two Super Micro employees following a raid of the company’s local offices.
In the quarter that ended June 30, Super Micro reported sales climbed 93% to US$11.1 billion and profit, excluding some items, was US$1.70 a share. Analysts, on average, estimated sales of US$11.3 billion and earnings of US$1.59 a share. Adjusted gross margin was 17.6%.
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