NEW YORK (AP) -- Intel Corp. raised its third-quarter revenue forecast above Wall Street's expectations Friday, citing strong demand for its chips and giving another signal that business is improving for one of the world's biggest technology companies. Intel shares rose 4 percent.

The leading maker of computer microprocessors now expects sales of $8.8 billion to $9.2 billion. Its last guidance, which came July 14, was for revenue in the range of $8.1 billion to $8.9 billion.

Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters were expecting $8.55 billion in revenue before Friday.

Santa Clara, Calif.-based Intel also said it expects the quarter's gross profit margin to be in the upper half of the range it previously forecast.

Because it gets most of its revenue from selling chips that are the "brains" of personal computers, Intel is indicating that PC makers are loading up on new chips faster than even it expected. While that suggests PC makers believe demand for the computers they're building will be strong, it doesn't necessarily mean they're selling briskly yet.

Intel is benefiting from the fact that PC makers had burned through a lot of their inventory, instead of buying new chips, as the financial crisis worsened. Now they have to restock ahead of what they're hoping will be a healthy back-to-school and holiday season.

Consumer demand for PCs is stabilizing or improving slightly from deeply depressed levels, as shown in the latest quarterly results from the world's top two PC makers, Hewlett-Packard Co. and Dell Inc. But the PC

SAN JOSE DE LAS LAJAS, Cuba (AP) -- Cuban rum maestro Jose Navarro's taste buds sing when he sips Havana Club, the sweet spirit distilled in this farming town south of the capital.

"It has to be Cuban," said Navarro, the oldest of the island's nine certified rum experts. "Havana Club can't exist anywhere else."

But another Havana Club does exist, one made by Bermuda-based rum giant Bacardi Ltd. A variety of Cohiba cigars, once rolled exclusively for Fidel Castro, is produced by Swedish Match North America of Virginia, and a Miami firm offers its own version of Cubita, a top Cuban coffee.

Washington's 47-year-old trade embargo has kept Cuban products out of the U.S. -- but hasn't prevented companies from using the communist island's brand names.

As the U.S. and Cuba consider better ties, such trademark issues would have be settled before any easing of the embargo. The fight between Bacardi and the Cuban government for the Havana Club name already has played out in the U.S. courts and Congress for more than a decade -- and is now before Spain's high court.

But the battles are about so much more than brand names. They are charged with 50 years of emotion over Fidel Castro's 1959 revolution and expropriation of private companies as he implemented socialism. They are also rooted in the future as U.S. corporations face the specter of new competition from Cuban