SanDisk drops 13% in pre-market trade after lowering 2015 revenue outlook

LONDON (ShareCast) - US tech firm SanDisk Corp (NasdaqGS: SNDK - news) on Thursday downgraded its sales outlook for the year and first quarter of 2015 on the back of lower than expected revenues from its enterprise business. The software and storage solutions firm, known best for flash memory cards, fell over 13% in pre-market trading on Wall Street, a day after the tech-rich Nasdaq 100 sunk on concerns about weaker technology sales across the sector.

On Wednesday, the Nasdaq Composite finished down 2.4% at 4,877 points while SanDisk shares lost 3.6% to $81.18.

SanDisk also withdrew its other forecasts for the quarter and year and now expects to post revenue of $1.3bn for the quarter ending March 29, compared with the $1.4bn to $1.45bn in revenue it had forecast in January.

The reduced earnings forecasts come after the company earlier this year warned that revenue would continue to contract through the first half of 2015 as it focuses on rebuilding inventory.

SanDisk on Thursday said it expects those struggles to persist for the year and said it expects full-year revenue to be lower than its previous guidance, but it didn't specify by how much.

"We are disappointed with our financial outlook," said chief executive Sanjay Mehrotra. "We will work through these headwinds, leveraging our compelling product roadmap and broadening customer base," he added.