Tesla Supplier Mobileye Beats On Earnings, Stock Falls
Mobileye ( MBLY ), the provider of advanced driver assistance systems that includes luxury electric carmaker Tesla Motors ( TSLA ) as a customer, reported better-than-expected first-quarter earnings Thursday. Mobileye reported revenue of $75.2 million, up 65% year over year and topping the consensus estimate of $73.3 million, but it was the second quarter in a row of revenue deceleration. The Jerusalem-based company reported adjusted earnings of 15 cents a share, a penny above the consensus estimate as polled by Thomson Reuters and up 88% year over year. Mobileye stock was down 5.5%, near 34.55 during morning trading in the stock market today . The stock is up 47% since hitting an all-time low of 23.57 on Feb. 9. “Our first-quarter results highlight consistently solid performance on the current business and continued investment into recently-announced innovative technologies,” said Chief Executive Ziv Aviram, in a statement with the earnings release. “Our EyeQ4 chip is achieving excellent performance ahead of its official launch on already sourced programs for 2018, while we are in advanced development of our fifth generation EyeQ chip planned to be launched in 2020.” Mobileye said EyeQ chip volume increased 62% year over year. Tesla, General Motors ( GM ), Ford Motor ( F ) and other automakers, along with tech giants like Alphabet-owned Google are racing to develop autonomous, self-driving car technology. Mobileye’s backup cameras and other high-tech gear are seen as key to such systems. According to one news report , Tesla Chief Executive Elon Musk was at Mobileye’s headquarters last month. Musk allegedly viewed demonstrations of new Mobileye technology out in the field. Tesla reported a first-quarter loss that was smaller than expected. But the big news was that Tesla plans to hit its annualized production target of 500,000 vehicles by 2018, two years earlier than previously planned.