Atmel Blows Away Estimates, Stock up 6% (ATML)

Atmel® Corporation ATML reported fourth quarter earnings that blew away Wall Street estimates, and the stock is moving higher in after hours. The microcontroller and touch solutions company reported earnings of 25 cents per share on revenues of $458 million. Wall Street had been expecting earnings of 16 cents per share on revenues of $436.22 million. “Our fourth quarter results exceeded our expectations as we continued to experience strong customer demand and improved product mix across all business segments,” said Steve Laub, Atmel's President and Chief Executive Officer. “Microcontroller revenues reached new records as both our 8-bit and 32-bit products continued to benefit from broad-based strength in the market. Atmel's market leading touchscreen solutions, led by our maXTouch™ products, continued their strong growth, easily surpassing our goal of $140 million in revenues during calendar 2010. We remain confident in our business with continuing design win momentum in our microcontroller products and recently announced new generation of touch solutions.” At last check, shares of Atmel were up 89 cents to $15.55, a gain of 6.07% in after-hours.