SiGe sees earnings jump 63%

SiGe Semiconductor has reported that revenues for 2005 were US $31.8 million, an increase of 63% over 2004.

SiGe Semiconductor has reported that revenues for 2005 were US $31.8 million, an increase of 63% over 2004 revenues of $19.5 million.

Sales were fuelled by the growing demand for SiGe's radio front end integrated circuits (ICs), which deliver performance and manufacturing efficiencies to WLAN, WiMAX, Bluetooth and GPS applications.

The company also announced the appointment of William H Burke as Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer.

Burke will be based in SiGe's Boston office, and brings to SiGe Semiconductor more than 20 years of experience in all aspects of corporate finance, accounting and treasury functions for multinational private and public companies.

Burke has held executive level positions responsible for debt and equity financing, mergers and acquisitions, and initial public offerings.

"2005 was an exceptional year for SiGe Semiconductor".

"We solidified our leadership across target markets, increased customer traction, and experienced significant growth in sales", said Jim Derbyshire, President and CEO, SiGe Semiconductor.

"To effectively manage this growth and move the company toward its next stage in development, I am pleased to add William Burke to the executive team".

Prior to joining SiGe Semiconductor, Burke served as Executive Vice President, Chief Financial Officer and Executive Vice President of Business Development at Riverdeep, a multinational software company offering educational and productivity applications for schools and consumers.

While in these roles, Burke led a dual listed initial public offering (Nasdaq and Irish Stock Exchange) raising $140 million, and managed revenue growth from $5 million to over $225 million.

In addition, Riverdeep acquired the operations of The Learning Company and Broderbund during his tenure.

Burke has also served as Vice President of Finance and Administration at AXS-One (formerly Computron Software Corporation), and Senior Audit Manager at Andersen.

Burke is a certified public accountant (CPA), and holds a bachelors degree of business administration in accounting with honours from Northeastern University.

"Bill will ensure that SiGe achieves its financial objectives and delivers optimal return to our shareholders over the long term", said Derbyshire.

"His experience will be instrumental as we continue to expand our product line with complete radio and transceiver ICs that both, open the door to new partnerships, and enhance our profitability through higher margins".

During 2005, SiGe Semiconductor expanded its five award winning product lines with new RF front-end solutions that allow manufacturers to effectively integrate wireless capability into PCs and laptop computers, personal digital assistants (PDAs), digital cameras, computer peripherals, and broadband access equipment.

SiGe Semiconductor maintained its position as a leading supplier of power amplifiers and RF front-end modules to the WLAN and Bluetooth markets, and began supplying complete radio and transceiver ICs to the WiMAX and cellular positioning markets.

During the next year, SiGe Semiconductor will be among the first to deliver power amplifiers for new enhanced datarate (EDR) Bluetooth and 802.11n applications.

802.11n is a new Wi-Fi standard that will allow WLAN products to diversify away from the standard "data" centric applications (Internet) and move to other large consumer markets such as media distribution.

The company is also working with manufacturers to integrate its radio ICs into WiMAX broadband access equipment and GPS-enabled cellular handsets.

WiMAX in particular will drive revenue, since the technology is largely in place and will deliver significant benefits with low installation cost, wireless metro Ethernet point-to-multipoint links especially as a backhaul to 2G/3G sites or Wi-Fi hotspots.

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