Micron Technology posted one of the most dramatic earnings reports in recent memory this week, with the company's revenue more than quadrupling in its fiscal third quarter compared to a year ago. The stock jumped 15% in extended trading after the results came out Wednesday.
According to CNBC, Micron reported $41.46 billion in revenue, well above the $35.84 billion that analysts had expected. That compares to just $9.3 billion in revenue during the same period a year earlier. Earnings per share came in at $25.11, adjusted, against estimates of $20.78.
The explosion in revenue traces directly to the artificial intelligence boom. Memory prices have skyrocketed as AI chips consume the production capacity of the small number of vendors who make them. With data center demand rising steadily, prices have also climbed for memory used in smartphones, laptops, and other consumer devices.
CEO Sanjay Mehrotra addressed the supply situation directly during a call with analysts. "Our customers are recognizing that supply shortages in memory and storage will take considerable time to improve, even as we expect industry supply to improve gradually in 2028," he said.
The most explosive growth came from Micron's core data center business, where sales climbed more than sevenfold to $11.5 billion from $1.53 billion in the same period a year ago. Cloud memory revenue rose more than 300% to $13.77 billion. The company also recorded over $5 billion in data center solid state drive revenue.
Gross margin jumped to 84.9% in the third quarter, up from 74.9% in the prior period and just 39% a year earlier. Net income hit $28.24 billion, or $24.46 per share, compared to $1.89 billion, or $1.68 per share, in the year-ago quarter.
Micron's stock price is up roughly 700% over the past year, pushing the company's market cap past $1 trillion. The company's technology is essential for chips made by Nvidia and Google, as well as the servers that house their processors.
Micron also announced Wednesday that it has signed 16 long-term agreements with customers including data center operators and automakers. The deals lock in sales for three to five years. "When completed, we expect approximately half or more of our company revenue to be under these" strategic customer agreements, Mehrotra said. He described them as binding agreements requiring customers to purchase set volumes of Micron chips.
The company said it expects $22 billion in financial commitments tied to those long-term agreements. CFO Mark Murphy told analysts the structure benefits Micron. "We get visibility on our demand, it's committed volume that we can be confident about making our investments," he said.
Looking ahead to the current quarter, Micron said it expects revenue of around $50 billion, compared to $11.3 billion a year earlier. Analysts had been forecasting $43.58 billion, according to LSEG, meaning Micron's own guidance came in well above Wall Street's expectations as well.
