Qualcomm Sales Jump on iPhone, 5G Demand Surge

The company narrowly missed Wall Street’s sales expectations of $8.27 billion, but beat the bottom line protection of net income of $2.09 billion, according to analysts surveyed by FactSet.

Sales of chips for phones came in slightly below investor expectations that had been supercharged by Apple’s strong earnings a week ago. Qualcomm’s stock fell more than 8% in after-hours trading.

Qualcomm’s outlook for the current quarter of sales between $7.2 billion and $8 billion also topped Wall Street forecasts.

The chip business is really growing like crazy,” Chief Executive Steve Mollenkopf said. “It’s all the things we’ve been talking about—growth in content and growth in devices that’s significant sequentially and year over year.”

Mr. Mollenkopf is retiring this year.

Qualcomm is split into two divisions, one that focuses on making chips and another that profits from licensing Qualcomm’s patented technologies to others. Revenue in the licensing business rose 18% in the quarter, while sales were 81% higher in the chip business.

The company also saw strong growth in newer parts of its chip business. While it made $4.22 billion on chips for handsets, it also surpassed $1 billion in quarterly sales for the first time for chips that go into internet-of-things devices and dedicated circuitry that handles communications with cell towers.

Write to Asa Fitch at [email protected]

The company narrowly missed Wall Street’s sales expectations of $8.27 billion, but beat the bottom line protection of net income of $2.09 billion, according to analysts surveyed by FactSet.

Sales of chips for phones came in slightly below investor expectations that had been supercharged by Apple’s strong earnings a week ago. Qualcomm’s stock fell more than 8% in after-hours trading.

Qualcomm’s outlook for the current quarter of sales between $7.2 billion and $8 billion also topped Wall Street forecasts.

The chip business is really growing like crazy,” Chief Executive Steve Mollenkopf said. “It’s all the things we’ve been talking about—growth in content and growth in devices that’s significant sequentially and year over year.”

Mr. Mollenkopf is retiring this year.

Qualcomm is split into two divisions, one that focuses on making chips and another that profits from licensing Qualcomm’s patented technologies to others. Revenue in the licensing business rose 18% in the quarter, while sales were 81% higher in the chip business.

The company also saw strong growth in newer parts of its chip business. While it made $4.22 billion on chips for handsets, it also surpassed $1 billion in quarterly sales for the first time for chips that go into internet-of-things devices and dedicated circuitry that handles communications with cell towers.

Write to Asa Fitch at [email protected]