Lake Forest’s Western Digital Corp., a maker of disk drives, on Monday upped its outlook for the September quarter.
Shares were up about 2% in afterhours trading on a market value of nearly $5 billion.
Western Digital cited a pickup in demand and higher prices as the main reasons for the improved outlook.
The company said it is looking for sales of $1.6 billion to $1.65 billion for the quarter.
That’s up from its previous forecast of $1.45 billion to $1.5 billion, the company said.
Western Digital expects profits of $133 million to $142 million, up from an earlier forecast of $94 million to $103 million.
The forecast doesn’t include the company’s $1 billion buy of San Jose-based Komag Inc., which closed last week.
The deal stands to add to sales but have a near-term impact on profits because of acquisition-related charges.
Komag makes thin-film metal disks, the part of a drive that stores data. The buy allows Western Digital to produce just about all of a drive on its own.
With Komag, Western Digital sees slightly higher sales of $1.63 billion to $1.68 billion.
Profits could come in around $80 million with Komag in the mix, including a $50 million charge.
Analysts are expecting about $103 million.
