GlobalWafers Co (環球晶圓), the world’s No. 3 silicon wafer supplier, yesterday gave a lukewarm business outlook, saying that its revenue would be flat or grow by a single-digit percentage this year, as customers digest inventories slower than expected.
That means this year GlobalWafers would lag behind the global semiconductor industry’s revenue growth, which is estimated to be 15 to 20 percent year-on-year.
The company’s revenue last year increased 0.5 percent to NT$70.65 billion (US$2.24 billion), from NT$70.29 billion the previous year, its financial statement showed.
Photo: Grace Hung, Taipei Times
“Some of our customers still see their inventory days remain high. The positive thing is that the number is declining. Customers are taking actions to bring down their stock, but the speed is slower than we expected,” GlobalWafers chair Doris Hsu (徐秀蘭) told investors yesterday. “They prioritize consuming their inventory first before pulling in a new long-term agreement.”
GlobalWafers expects a more marked recovery in the second half of this year, after hitting the bottom this quarter, thanks to its customers’ improving inventory days and factory utilization, Hsu said.
Due to fewer supply agreements secured with its customers, the company reported a reduction in prepayments last quarter at NT$35.4 billion, sliding from NT$37.9 billion in the previous quarter.
The downtrend is likely to persist in the next two years, before growth resumes in 2026, thanks to rising demand for advanced chips, Hsu said.
GlobalWafers expects scant room for an improvement in its gross margin, given higher depreciation costs stemming from its capacity expansions worldwide and rising utility costs, the firm said.
GlobalWafers’ gross margin fell to 37.4 percent last year, from 43.2 percent in 2022.
The firm said artificial intelligence (AI) servers stimulate demand for advanced chips, such as high-bandwidth memory as well as mature chips.
The semiconductor industry is expected to benefit from the AI boom, it said.
This year would be the peak of the company’s capacity expansion globally, including fabs in Taiwan, Japan, Italy, South Korea, the US and Denmark, GlobalWafers said.
About half of the company’s three-year NT$100 billion capital expenditure budget would be allocated for this year, after spending 30 percent of the amount last year, it said.
GlobalWafers is scheduled to send samples to customers from its US facilities in the fourth quarter of this year, before ramping up production early next year, it said.
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