Lite-On Technology Corp (光寶科技) yesterday said the first quarter would be the trough for this year, and predicted revenue and profit to rebound from the second quarter and further strengthen in the second half of the year on the back of strong shipments of advanced power management solutions for artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure.
First-quarter revenue was NT$43.4 billion (US$1.38 billion), down 2.1 percent quarter-on-quarter but up 19.2 percent year-on-year, while net profit totaled NT$3.78 billion, down 2.2 percent quarterly, but up 9.23 percent annually.
Earnings per share stood at NT$1.66, down from NT$1.70 in the previous quarter, but up from NT$1.51 a year earlier.
Photo: CNA
The sequential decline in revenue and profit last quarter was mainly due to deferred orders from customers in the consumer market, such as gaming console makers, amid memory component shortages, Lite-On president Anson Chiu (邱森彬) said at an earnings conference in Taipei.
The company expects revenue this quarter to grow sequentially and annually due to robust shipments of next-generation AI power management systems, including 50V direct current (DC) integrated power racks and main power shelf products, for servers used by major cloud service providers, Chiu said.
This quarter, Lite-On expects strong market demand for its 33-kilowatt (kW) power shelves, 8.5kW power supply units, battery backup units and low Earth orbit satellite power solutions, he said.
The company’s new 110kW power shelf has progressed smoothly, with mass production scheduled for June, he said.
The company would also begin shipping in-rack cooling distribution units to customers in small volumes this quarter, he added.
Lite-On’s 110kW power shelves and 800V high-voltage DC products — capable of delivering more than 1.5 megawatts per rack — are expected to begin mass production in the fourth quarter, Chiu said.
The company maintained its goal of having AI-related businesses contribute more than 30 percent of total revenue this year, he said.
In the first quarter, sales in the cloud computing and AI-of-Things businesses accounted for 53 percent of total sales, followed by the information technology and consumer electronics businesses at 30 percent and the optoelectronics business at 17 percent.
Higher shipments of AI-related products are also expected to boost the company’s gross margin, which fell 0.9 percentage points year-on-year to 21.7 percent last quarter, Chiu said.
Lite-On’s board of directors yesterday approved the company’s US investment plan and a capital increase for its Vietnamese subsidiary, totaling US$1.07 billion, to expand its AI-related business.
Total capital expenditure this year is expected to double to NT$14 billion from NT$7 billion last year, Lite-On chief financial officer K.T. Lim (林建忠) said.
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