C'mon, just say it.
Everybody knows who's behind the inventory glut in wireless handsets these days. But in its earnings release yesterday, RF Micro
As expected, cell phone giant Motorola's
RF Micro chipped in fourth-quarter revenue of $257.3 million, 13.9% higher than last year. The company also grew earnings 42% to $0.13 per share. Revenue for the full fiscal year topped out at $1.02 billion, up 32% from $770.2 million last year.
The company is citing a shift in product cycles as reason for some optimism about the future. If it can successfully diversify newer, higher-margin products across more customers, hiccups in end product sales from a single customer (a.k.a. Motorola) won't hit earnings as hard.
But the reality is that RF Micro's reliance on major manufacturers, such as Nokia
With management's belief that excess inventory will drop next-quarter revenue to an expected range of $215 million to $230 million, investors don't have much to cheer about at this point. Until growth resumes later this year, the rest of the industry will have to party on without RF Micro and its secret party pooper.
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Fool contributor Dave Mock doesn't need a good reason to throw a party -- even bad reasons work fine. He owns shares of Motorola. Dave is the author of The Qualcomm Equation. The Fool has a disclosure policy.