Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger attempted to put a positive spin on the company’s third-quarter 2021 earnings call this week, despite the ongoing chip shortage and long-time CFO George Davis' decision to leave the company.

The chipmaker saw revenues grow 5% year over year to $19.2 billion, falling just shy of Q3 guidance. Meanwhile, net incomes showed signs of recovery from prior quarters, up 60% during the same period to $6.8 billion.

On the call Thursday, Gelsinger touted Intel’s recent successes including the groundbreaking of two new foundries in Arizona and upcoming Alder Lake CPUs, which are slated for release at Intel’s Innovation event next week.

Gelsinger also lamented the loss of Davis, thanking him for his 15 years of service at Intel. Davis will leave Intel in the first half of 2022.

Despite generally positive revenue growth, supply chain constraints that have been impacted in large part to a global semiconductor and substrate shortage, dogged the chipmaker in Q3, Davis said.

PC sales, which in recent months have helped offset Intel’s tumbling data center revenues, bore the brunt of the shortages in Q3. The company’s Client Computing Group (CCG) revenues fell 2% year over year to $9.7 billion.

According to Davis, shortages have forced original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) — like HP, Dell, and Lenovo — to restrict lower-end system sales in favor of higher-end, lower-volume products.

Davis also blamed the decline on the recent loss of Apple’s CPU and modem business. Excluding those losses, Intel’s Q3 CCG revenues would have increased 10% year over year, he claimed. Last November, Apple began transitioning away from Intel CPUs across its Macintosh product line in favor of its internally developed M-series chips.

While PC-related revenues declined during the quarter, Intel’s Data Center Group (DCG) showed signs of recovery, posting positive revenue growth for the first time in a year. Intel reported DCG revenues up 10% year over year to $6.5 billion, which according to Davis was due to a healthy increase in enterprise and government spending during the third quarter.

“These results were slightly below expectations due to industrywide component supply constraints that primarily impacted our enterprise customers and areas of softness in [the People’s Republic of China] including cloud, as customers adapt to new regulations,” Davis said.

However, Gelsinger expressed confidence in the company’s DCG unit. “I remain confident about the long term of the data center, despite regulatory changes in China and short-term ecosystem supply constraints, impacting some customers,” he said.

Intel’s Mobileye autonomous driving division and Internet of Things Group (IOTG) saw strong growth during the quarter, up 39% ($326 million) and 54% ($1 billion) year over year, respectively.

“IOTG achieved all-time record quarterly revenue,” Davis boasted.

The company’s Programmable Solutions Group (PSG) also saw robust growth during the quarter, up 16% year over year to $478 million. Intel’s PSG is responsible for a variety of technologies including its FPGAs and eASIC products.

Intel projects revenues to remain flat in the fourth quarter. The company forecasts revenues of $19.2 billion, with earnings per share of approximately 70 cents.

Full year, the company predicts revenues of approximately $77.7 billion. Capital expenditures are expected to come in at between $18 billion and $19 billion, in line with the chipmaker’s planned foundry expansion.

Intel announced two new chip fabs in Arizona this spring, with plans for a third European fab expected before the end of the year.

According to Gelsinger, Intel is already in the process of selecting a European site and expressed optimism regarding the possibility of government assistance to offset the extreme cost of foundry operations.

“We’re hopeful the CHIPS act will be passed by the end of this year, allowing us to accelerate decisions for our next U.S. site,” he said. “It is abundantly clear to us that we must invest in our future right now to accelerate past the rest of the industry and regain unquestioned leadership in what we do.”