Intel profits surge as PC market recovers

Thirteen per cent rise in profits, eight per cent rise in sales in positive third quarter results

Chip maker giant Intel posted a third quarter full of positive results, with a 13 per cent rise in profits and an eight per cent rise in sales.

Net profit for the third quarter rose to $3.32bn (£2.09bn) from $2.95bn (£1.84bn) a year earlier, while sales rose to $14.6bn (£9.1bn) as a result of recovering demand for PCs. This beat analyst estimates of $14.4bn (£9.1bn).

Intel's PC business saw sales rise nine per cent year-on-year, perhaps as a result of the hardware refresh that has been prompted by migration away from Windows XP.

The software and services operating divisions posted revenues of $558m (£350m) up two per cent year-on-year, while the Internet of Things group saw a 14 per cent increase from 2013 to $530m (£333m).

"We are pleased by the progress the company is making," said Intel CEO Brian Krzanich.

"We achieved our best-ever revenue and strong profits in the third quarter. There is more to do, but our results give us confidence that we're successfully executing to our strategy of extending our products across a broad range of exciting new markets," said Krzanich.

Despite shipping a record quarterly number of chips for PCs, servers, tablets, phones - the company said it was the first time it had shipped more than 100 million microprocessors in one quarter - the mobile side posted disappointing revenues of just $1m (£630,000) as it struggles to compete against chip makers who base their processors on designs from ARM Holdings.

However, a slowdown in tablet sales - Gartner recently claimed that global sales of tablet devices would level off because buyers were opting for hybrid laptop-tablet models or larger smartphones such as the Apple iPhone 6 Plus - could be in Intel's favour. Intel has a relatively weak presence in tablets, and a slowdown could see activity displaced to PCs and other areas where its chips enjoy a larger share.