Marvell Technology Group Ltd. (NASDAQ:MRVL) stock fell sharply in premarket trading on Friday following the release of the company’s fiscal second-quarter earnings which showed a 52% decline in earnings owing to continued weakness in demand for its bread-and-butter products. MRVL’s earnings have now dropped for six straight quarters.
For the quarter, profit stood at $93.1 million, or 16 cents a share, compared to $192.4 million, or 31 cents a share in the year earlier quarter. After adjusting onetime expenses and stock based compensation, earnings came at 24 cents down from 38 cents.
Revenue fell 9.1% to $816.1 million
Commenting over extremely disappointing second quarter results, MRVL’s Chief Executive in a conference call said that results were mainly affected by sluggish global economic environment which impacted its storage and mobile end markets.
Based in Santa Clara, California, Marvel Technology specializes in making chips and components for hard-disk drives, networking equipment and mobile devices. Since last year, the company has been struggling as one of its biggest mobile customers, BlackBerry maker Research in Motion Limited (NASDAQ: RIM), continues to witness weakness in business amid rising competition. Besides, severe flooding in Thailand also resulted in supply chain disruptions for its hard drive manufacturing.
Lately, the demand for its products from mobile and wireless customers in China has also shown stark weakness. Now, in order to boost its sales and profitability, the company is focusing on rapidly growing 3G smartphone market of China.
MRVL stock fell nearly 10% in premarket trading on Friday.