(San Francisco) Intel said it achieved its best quarterly and annual revenue in its history last year, driven by strong demand for electronic chips, but the microprocessor giant is seeing its profits hurt by rising costs of production.
Posted at 5:34 p.m.
The group collected 79 billion dollars in revenue over the year, above its forecasts (77.7 billion). From October to December, it earned $20.5 billion (+3% year-on-year), but its net profit plunged 21% to $4.6 billion.
The global shortage of computer chips affects many sectors, as they are essential to the manufacture of many products, from smartphones and computers, to cars and vacuum cleaners.
Intel finds itself at the heart of this phenomenon, benefiting on the one hand from the increased demand for its technologies, but also suffering from supply difficulties.
Its microprocessor branch, the group’s largest, earned $10.1 billion in revenue in the fourth quarter, down 7% year-on-year. Its electronic equipment business for data centers rose 20% to $7.3 billion.
Intel invested heavily in semiconductor production in the United States and Europe last year, with a strategy outlined in March that relies on both expanding in-house manufacturing and increasing the use of subcontractors. contractors.
But Pat Gelsinger, the boss, estimated in July that the supply problem could last until 2023.
The Biden administration on Tuesday urged Congress to pass legislation to help US manufacturing of essential products such as semiconductors, pointing out that manufacturers have seen their reserves dwindle to an alarming level.
The Commerce Department conducted a survey of manufacturers including automakers and medical device makers that found median inventory fell from 40 days of inventory in 2019 to less than 5 days in 2021.
“If a wave of COVID-19, natural disaster or political instability were to disrupt a foreign semiconductor factory for even just a few weeks, it could lead to the closure of a manufacturing plant in the United States, putting American workers and their families at risk,” the department said in a statement.