Graphics processor maker Nvidia Corp. (NASDAQ: NVDA) reports fourth-quarter earnings after markets close today, and analysts are expecting EPS of $0.21 on revenue of $894.6 million. When Nvidia reported its third-quarter earnings in November it projected fourth-quarter revenue of $886 million, saying that it was making up some lost ground in desktop PCs.

But that’s not where Nvidia’s future lies. The future is mobile, and if Nvidia can deliver on the new version of the Tegra processor it showed off at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona yesterday, the company could have anywhere from a year to eighteen-month head start on its competitors at the high end of the mobile market. Qualcomm Corp. (NASDAQ: QCOM), Intel Corp. (NASDAQ: INTC) and Texas Instruments are all preparing a new generation of mobile device processors, but Nvidia has the pole position.

Nvidia demonstrated a quad-core processor based on the company’s Tegra 2 processor, which is a dual-core mobile processor that uses a core licensed from ARM Holdings, plc (NASDAQ: ARMH). The quad-core design contains the power of four CPUs, as well as the graphics processing power of 12 graphics chips. Nvidia is shipping the quad-core processor in sample quantities now, but expects to ship customer quantities in time for the processor to be built into smartphones and tablets for the 2011 holiday season.

The quad-core processor, code-named Kal-el (Superman’s baby name before Marlon Brando put him in a spaceship headed toward earth), is the first of a family of increasingly powerful mobile processors on Nvidia’s roadmap through 2014. Three even more powerful processors, code-named Wayne, Logan, and Stark, are slated for release at the rate of one per year. Nvidia’s general manager for its mobile business expects the Stark processor to offer 75 times the performance of today’s chips.

Nvidia’s current Tegra 2 dual-core chip is the brains behind the Xoom tablet from Motorola Mobility Holdings Co. (NYSE: MMI), the G-Slate from LG Electronics, and the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1. Samsung has also announced plans to use the Tegra 2 in its Optimus 2X smartphones.

So far, Nvidia has not said which manufacturers will use the quad-core processor or for which products. But provided that Kal-el can be easily substituted for Tegra 2, there are a few obvious names in the pool of potential products.

Nvidia shares are up 3.5% at about noon today, within the 52-week range of $8.65-$26.17. Technically, the problem for Nvidia is living up to its P/E ratio for the past 12 months of 63.48. A lot of the good stuff that is about to happen at the company may already be priced in.

Paul Ausick

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