Applied Micro Circuits Corp., a San Diego-based...

Applied Micro Circuits Corp., a San Diego-based manufacturer of integrated circuits, has raised $12 million in capital through the private sale of convertible preferred stock, the company announced Monday.

Proceeds from the offering will be used to help pay off short-term debt and to finance the company’s recent expansion of its Sorrento Valley facilities to 120,000 square feet of office and manufacturing space, up from 43,000 square feet. The expansion will eventually include a new wafer fabrication facility, the company said.

The short-term financing was necessary because of a “shortfall of revenues” that AMCC reported for the fiscal year ended March 31. The closely held company reported “about $18 million” in revenues this year, spokesman Don Davis said, a slight decrease from the previous year. AMCC had hoped to book sales in the “mid-$20-million” range, he said.

AMCC lost money over the fiscal year ended March but Davis would not specify how much, nor would he say what the company’s accumulated losses have totaled since it was founded in 1979.

Among the venture capital investors buying the convertible preferred stock were Sequoia Capital, Matrix Partners, U.S. Venture Partners and Adler & Co. Including the recent stock sale, venture capitalists have chipped in $36 million since AMCC’s founding in 1979.

In July, AMCC hired Al Martinez as president to replace Jonathan Yu, who resigned in March “to pursue other interests,” Davis said. Martinez previously was an executive at TRW LSI Products division in San Diego.

AMCC currently employs 250 people, up about 8% from the total this time last year, Davis said. AMCC’s application-specific integrated circuits are used in a variety of products including automated test equipment, color computer graphics hardware and telecommunications instruments.