Robertson Stephens Rotating Back into Selected Computer Hardware Related Companies

Business Wire, Jan 10, 2000

Business Editors

SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jan. 10, 2000

Robertson Stephens Managing Director and Senior Electronics Analyst Daniel T. Niles, a 1999 Wall Street Journal Analyst and a 1999 member of the Institutional Investor All-America Research Team, today upgraded or raised estimates on a group of computer hardware related companies including Sun Microsystems, Intel and Advanced Micro Devices.

This follows the downgrade on April 12th of a wide group of computer hardware related companies based on concerns over falling average selling prices for personal computers and concerns over spending slowdowns at year end related to Y2K. Dan now believes it is time to start rotating back into some selected computer hardware stocks as 1) corporations start to increase computer hardware spending following the Y2K induced slowdown at year-end, 2) Windows 2000K drives another PC hardware upgrade cycle and 3) traditional brick and mortar companies try to .com themselves in the new millennium.

In a first step, Dan today is upgrading Intel and Sun to Buy while increasing estimates on AMD by 50 percent.

"We are raising our price target on AMD from $35 to $40 following our initial upgrade of the stock to Buy on August 9th at $17-3/8. We are raising our revenues for fourth quarter 1999 from $834 million to $959 million (up 45 percent quarter-to-quarter) and our earnings-per-share from a loss of $0.10 to $0.26 profit," said Niles. "We believe that AMD saw a strong surge towards the end of the quarter with microprocessor unit sales of 6 million, versus our prior forecast of 5.1 million. We believe that average-selling-prices were also higher at $87, versus our $83 forecast and processor revenues were about $523 million up 77 percent quarter-to-quarter or $100 million more than our prior forecast. We forecast that non-processor revenues were also strong driven by flash, which increased by 30 percent quarter-to-quarter to $270 million."

"We are also raising our fiscal 2000 earnings-per-share for from $1.00 to $1.50," said Niles "This is driven by a new revenue forecast of $4.0 billion, versus our prior forecast of $3.6 billion. We are now modeling processor units of 23 million, versus our prior forecast of 18 million. We believe these new forecasts are also conservative."

Clients interested in receiving more information should contact their salesperson at (415) 781-9700.

Robertson Stephens (www.rsco.com) is the leading full-services investment bank focused exclusively on growth companies. In 1999, the firm completed over 230 public offerings and over 40 private offerings, raising more than $40 billion in capital for clients. In addition, the firm advised on over 80 M&A transactions in 1999 with an aggregate value in excess of $50 billion. The firm's 47 equity research analysts cover nearly 700 companies. Founded in 1978, Robertson Stephens (Legal name: FleetBoston Robertson Stephens Inc.) is a section 20 subsidiary of FleetBoston Financial Corporation (NYSE: FBF) and a member of the NASD and all major exchanges. Together, Robertson Stephens, Fleetboston Robertson Stephens International Ltd., and Robertson Stephens Evergreen Securities Ltd. employ over 1,000 employees worldwide with offices in Boston, San Francisco, New York, Menlo Park, Chicago, London, and Tel Aviv.

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