SiliconBeat

Salaries of the executive officers at Atheros Communications, which were reduced Feb. 1 in a cost saving measure, were restored Monday by the board’s compensation committee. Chief Executive Craig Barratt, who had his annual salary cut 40 percent to $204,000, will now be paid at an annual rate of $340,000. Other executives, who had their salaries cut 20 percent, also had their pay raised back to 2008 levels.

The committee re-evaluated the salary reductions light of better-than-expected results Atheros announced yesterday for its 2009 second quarter, and for its third quarter forecast earnings of from 29 to 31 cents a share, significantly higher than the 17 cents average analyst estimate in a Thomson Reuters survey were expecting. Shares of Atheros popped today, rising $1.83, or 8.1 percent, to close at $24.35.

It is certainly a welcome relief for the company, whose CEO warned in December that the “economic environment deteriorated significantly throughout the (2008) fourth quarter and consumer demand across multiple geographies weakened.”

Atheros Communications significantly lowered its estimate for its fourth quarter sales to between $95 million and $100 million, about 30 percent below the “record” sales it reported for its 20087 third quarter, a much bigger decline than the at-most 5 percent decline it projected on Oct. 27, according to a filing the Santa Clara company made Wednesday after the markets closed.

“The economic environment deteriorated significantly throughout the fourth quarter and consumer demand across multiple geographies weakened,” according to Atheros Chief Executive Craig Barratt, in a written statement. “Additionally throughout the supply chain there have been aggressive reductions in inventory levels as the quarter progressed resulting in order cancellations and rescheduling of existing backlog. While we anticipated a weakening economy in the fourth quarter, demand from our PC OEM channel and to a lesser extent, our networking channel, slowed considerably more than expected.”