Arm CEO talks company’s future beyond smartphones after first quarterly report since IPO

Arm CEO Rene Haas discussed the company's business beyond smartphones with CNBC's Jim Cramer, saying less than half of its revenue comes from that segment.
The company made its market debut in September with an initial public offering valued at over $54 billion.

Rene Haas, CEO of semiconductor company Arm, told CNBC's Jim Cramer on Wednesday that the company has moved beyond its beginnings, where it was primarily known for designing technology used in smartphones.

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Arm designs graphics chips and licenses them to companies, collecting royalties to earn much of its revenue. Arm partners include Apple, Google and Amazon Web Services. Haas said 70% of the world's population touches Arm in some way, with its technology present in many widely-used devices including electric cars, digital TVs and smart locks.

"We were largely associated with smartphones," he said. "Today, less than half of our revenue comes from that segment. We are a very, very different company."

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The company made its market debut in September with an initial public offering valued at over $54 billion. On Wednesday, the chip designer released its first quarterly report since its IPO, reporting revenue that beat Wall Street's expectations.

Haas also discussed the company's role in the next generation of personal computers, saying Arm will enable these devices to run efficiently as they support more AI algorithms.

"The experience you get on these PCs — great performance, low battery life — again, that's what we're really good at," he said. "So I think we're into a refresh cycle for PCs and phones."