Last week, Altera Corp. (ALTR) announced that it will eliminate approximately 3% of its workforce in order to streamline its cost structure. The company’s headcount currently stands at 2700. The eliminations will take effect in the third quarter and result in severance charges of approximately $4 million – $5 million. Altera expects to realize annualized savings of about $9 million from the restructuring.

Altera designs, manufactures and markets a broad range of high-performance, high-density programmable logic devices (PLDs), such as field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs) and complex programmable logic devices (CPLDs).

Management seems to be taking steps to improve profitability after the slump in second-quarter earnings. Last month, the company reported quarterly sales of $279.2 million, which were up 6% sequentially, but down 22% year over year.

Operating margin came in at 24%, down from 31.6% in the last quarter. Net income slumped to $47.4 million from $98 million

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Altera Corp. (ALTR, Buy) issued its mid-quarter update for Q2, ending in June, yesterday. Judging from the share-price performance so far today (down nearly 5%), investors appear to have taken the news with a grain of salt. Perhaps the absence of an upside in guidance is the reason for the shares negative performance so far today.Investors may recall that ALTR shares got a boost last week following a sell-side analyst raising his Q2 EPS estimates by a penny, compared to our and consensus estimates of $0.16, based mainly on expectation that the company will boost its second-quarter forecast during the mid-quarter update. Apparently the company has not done so, resulting in a reversal of gains from last week.But it remains to be seen whether the company can deliver improved results compared to our and consensus expectations, given the company's reiteration that "demand from OEMs ...

The market is showing signs of relief as the major indices have experienced some great up days despite a lack of positive news regarding our economy.  As an investor, you maybe wondering what your options are to return to the equity market with as much prudence as possible.  The first thing to note is that the IT S&P 500 Component has done extremely well, up 11.80% YTD.  A great way to re-enter IT is through the purchase of well constructed Exchange Traded Funds (ETFs). ETFs are a great way to capture the upside potential of various companies while maintaining diversity within your IT portfolio (or any portfolio).  The key to ETF evaluation is to select low cost and well constructed ETFs making it important to conduct due diligence on the major underlying securities of the vehicle.  ETFs can

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Xilinx Inc. (XLNX) recently announced fiscal fourth-quarter and full-year results. The company delivered earnings per share of 20 cents, excluding items, topping analysts' estimates by 11%.

< ?DART(15);?> Company Description

Xilinx Inc. designs, develops and manufacture programmable logic solutions. The company offers advanced integrated circuits in the form of programmable logic devices (PLDs). PLDs represent an exciting growth potential in the chip market thanks to their flexible nature and ability to change functionality even after being manufactured.

Xilinx programmable solutions fuel product innovation in diverse markets worldwide and are designed in a wide range of applications. Xilinx customers can change or upgrade product features and functions "on the fly" - adapting to new standards and reconfiguring the hardware for a specific application. This "on the fly" technology enables faster time-to-market, product differentiation and reduced cost.

Solid Earnings

The company recently announced fiscal fourth-quarter and full-year results. The company delivered

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Based in San Jose, California, Altera Corporation (ALTR) designs, manufactures, and markets a broad range of high-performance, high-density programmable logic devices (PLDs) such as field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs) and complex programmable logic devices (CPLDs).ALTR is experiencing slower than anticipated sales across all market segments, particularly in the Computer & Storage and Consumer market segments. Management attributed it to inventory reductions by a broad range of end customers across all market segments.The gross margin improved to 69.2% from 64.1% generated in Q4:07 and was up from 67.1% in the previous quarter, mainly due to ongoing cost savings initiatives and product mix. ALTR announced that they have started shipping 40nm Stratix IV devices to customers during Q4.Going forward, management expects a further decline in demand from all its end markets and estimates sales to decline in the range of 15%-25% in Q1. We maintain ...

Zacks senior semiconductor industry analyst Abdul Saleh was on hand recently to give us his updated viewpoint of this sector. He even told us what his top three semi Buy-recommended stocks are at this time.

What’s new in the semiconductor industry lately?

With a slowdown in the domestic economy, the chip companies are looking globally -- notably Russia, India, China and South America -- for growth, where the demand for technology is growing at a healthy 30-40% clip. In fact, Intel’s (INTC) CEO Craig Barrett was interviewed recently on this subject and reiterated this viewpoint.

The Street has not bought this thesis as yet, but if the numbers turn out to be what the companies are projecting, it may be positive for investors. Also, we got some exposure with the media in this sector -- I, myself did an IBD interview on Atheros (ATHR) recently -- and our

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Zacks senior semiconductor industry analyst Abdul Saleh was on hand recently to give us his updated viewpoint of this sector. He even told us what his top three semi Buy-recommended stocks are at this time.

What’s new in the semiconductor industry lately?

< ?DART(15);?> With a slowdown in the domestic economy, the chip companies are looking globally -- notably Russia, India, China and South America -- for growth, where the demand for technology is growing at a healthy 30-40% clip. In fact, Intel’s (

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Altera's (ALTR) return on equity (ROE) of 35% crushes the industry average of 4%. The company is yielding 1%, which compares favorably to its peers as Altera is operating in an industry that offers very little in the way of dividends.

Company Description

Altera provides programmable logic devices (PLD), application-specific integrated circuits (ASIC), pre-defined design building blocks, and associated development tools. The company serves customers primarily in the communications, computer and storage, consumer, and industrial sectors. ALTR markets its products through a network of distributors, independent sales representatives, and direct sales personnel. It has operations primarily in North America, the Asia Pacific, Europe, and Japan.

ALTR Backed Guidance

The company recently reaffirmed that it expects third quarter sales to be flat to 3% lower than that of the year-prior. Altera added that it will announce third quarter results after market close on October 14, 2008.

Growth in the Second Quarter

Altera reported its second-quarter

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Zacks senior semiconductor industry analyst Abdul Saleh was on hand recently to give us his updated viewpoint of this sector. He even told us what his top three semi Buy-recommended stocks are at this time.

What’s new in the semiconductor industry lately?

With a slowdown in the domestic economy, the chip companies are looking globally -- notably Russia, India, China and South America -- for growth, where the demand for technology is growing at a healthy 30-40% clip. In fact, Intel’s (INTC) CEO Craig Barrett was interviewed recently on this subject and reiterated this viewpoint.

The Street has not bought this thesis as yet, but if the numbers turn out to be what the companies are projecting, it may be positive for investors. Also, we got some exposure with the media in this sector -- I, myself did an IBD interview on Atheros (ATHR) recently -- and our

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