Good evening, and thank you for joining us. I'm with Stefano Berretta, our CFO, presenting the first half 2024 results and the guidance for the third quarter of this year. As usual, a Q&A session will follow at the end of the presentation. As expected, results achieved in the first half have been mainly related to the seasonal ramp of a new mobile application processor, which contributed to the 37% sequential growth. The semiconductor market presented a mixed picture of recovery, with faster than expected growth of semiconductors related to generative AI on one hand, and continued softness in the semiconductor for automotive and industrial equipment, on the other hand. Drilling down to different verticals. So first, more consumer-exposed markets and related inventories are completing the process of normalization, expected to turn to recovery within the end of this year.
According to preliminary data from International Data Corporation, the global smartphone shipments rose 6.5% in the second quarter, marking the fourth consecutive quarter growth. Full recovery in demand is yet to come around as it remain challenged in some markets. Second point is the artificial intelligence, which remains the biggest growth driver, mainly boosted by data center, and it is expected to remain stronger also in the next quarters, powered by Edge AI and inference applications. Third is automotive and industrial applications, which remains sluggish, suffering of the ongoing inventory correction started in the last quarter of 2023, which is expected to last at least until the end of the year. Finally, some overview about the market, how we see the market.
Latest available data released by Semiconductor Industry Association on June 2024 shows 7% growth year-on-year in core semis, showing a positive year-over-year growth for the 11th consecutive month. We continue to keep our sights on a second half recovery, yet acknowledge uncertainty around the auto industrial and consumer demand recovery timelines. Overall, we believe long-term secular growth trends around the AI proliferation, increasing semi complexity, auto industrial, electrification remain intact. Now, let me turn to Stefano Berretta, who will give you more color on numbers.
Thank you, Stefano, good afternoon again. As you will have seen in our press release, our revenues in the second quarter were approximately EUR 139.3 million, slightly below the middle range of our guidance, and registering an increase of 32.7% compared to the same quarter of prior year, with a sequential increase of 36.8% compared to Q1 2024.
The gross profit as well increased at 3.6% compared to the same period of 2023, up to EUR 55.7 million, representing a 41.4% margin, as also guided during our prior call, while the EBITDA decreased to -4.8% compared to the second quarter of 2023, and down to EUR 36 million, representing now a 35.8% margin, as also expected and guided during our prior call. If we move to the year-to-date figures, total revenue were EUR 241.1 million, with a year-on-year increase of 22.8%. The gross profit was EUR 100.8 million, 1% lower compared to the same period of 2023, representing now a margin close to 42%.
The EBITDA closed at EUR 60.7 million, down 6.2% compared to the same period of 2023, and representing a margin of 25.2%. For the completeness of information and comparison purposes, it's worth to remind that, all the above figures include a new perimeter of consolidation, inclusive of the contribution of Harbor Electronics, acquired in August 2023, and DIS Tech, acquired at the end of May 2024. And both of them were not present in the same period of 2023. On this page, you can see a summary comparison between the financials at the end of the first six months, 2023 and 2024.
Just to comment further, revenue year-on-year increase of 22.8% was half driven by the greater recovery of the consumer segment and by volumes related to the artificial intelligence, and for the other half, by the contribution of the Harbor and DIS Tech entities, and all of them partially mitigated by the weakness in the automotive and industrial segment. If we go to the revenue expressed at constant currency, so using the same average and fixed rates at the end of the first half of 2023, would have been approximately EUR 2.5 million higher than the reported revenue, so meaning only a 1% unfavorable impact. On a gross profit level, the decrease in the margin from 51.9% to 41.8%...
Was the result of the expected dilution from the mentioned acquisitions, together with a relevant increase of depreciation following the investments in fixed assets made in the last 12 months, and also due to the growing complexity of our products and to the related and temporarily lower performance. Gross profit at constant currency, again, would have been approximately EUR 2.4 million higher just by using the six months of 2023 average rate. Consistently, the EBITDA reflected the same trend, excluding depreciation, of course, showing a decrease in the margin from 33% to 25.2%, including a negative forex impact for approximately EUR 1.6 million. We would highlight that the EBITDA was also impacted by a significant amount of R&D costs in this semester, approximately in the region of EUR 13 million.
EUR 3 million more compared to the amount recorded in the same period of 2023, and representing now between 12% and 13% of our revenues. Confirming once again, the mindset and the commitment of our leadership to continuously develop new products and solutions. Finally, just to mention the net financial position, it is up for almost EUR 300 million in the semester, mainly due to EUR 36 million generated through the operating activities. EUR 385 million generated through the capital increase, following the Teradyne acquisition of 10% stake, both of them partially offset by EUR 43 million absorbed by the investments of the period, and EUR 18 million absorbed by the acquisition of DIS Tech.
So now we project an overall recovery in our reference market for the second part of the year, and will be more pronounced in terms of volumes and revenue contribution in the last part of the year, so in Q4. It's worth to underline that the following guidance for the third quarter includes the contribution of DIS business for 13 weeks, so 3 months approximately, compared to the only 5 working weeks that were hitting the second quarter. That said, the second quarter of the year is expected to show the following: so revenue to be about EUR 150 million ±3%; the gross margin in the range of 41% ±2%; and the EBITDA margin in the range of 23% ±2%. So thanks, everyone, for your attention.
Now we can move to the Q&A session.
Thank you to the speakers today. We now have an opportunity for questions. As a reminder, if you would like to ask a question, please use the Raise Hand function on your screen, or for those dialing in, it's star nine on your keypad. Once your name is announced, please unmute your line and say your company name before asking your question. Our first question today comes from Mr. Giovanni Selvetti. Please, Giovanni, the floor to you.
Hello, everyone. Thanks for taking my question. Can you hear me well?
Yes.
Yes.
Okay, thank you. So I have a couple, and the first one is related to the fact that on the slides you mentioned a shift in the sales mix toward products with higher marginality. So I was trying to understand what exactly do you mean by that, so, and what is affected by this ramp-up phase? The second question is more of a strategic one, if you wanna call it that way. So it seems that the company is doing all the right step in creating a complete product in, in backend testing. So is it fair to say now that the only component missing are sockets? And on, on this respect, would you rather invest organically in the technology, or are you considering, acquisition? The, the third is about client exposure.
I know that historically you haven't given the name of the clients, but is it fair to assume that Intel represent less than 10% of your revenues? And maybe the final one is on the guidance. So you're expecting the top line to pick up again in the quarter, which is encouraging, considering that your main competitor has guided for flat revenues in Foundry and Logic in Q3. But I was however expecting this to drive some margin expansion by operating leverage, and instead, margins are shrinking. So is this mainly due to higher R&D, or mainly because DIS is growing more than you expected? If you can elaborate a bit more on that. Thank you.
Let me start with the bottoms, then I hand over to Stefano Felici for the more business-related questions. About the margin and profitability, there's a decline in the Q3 compared to the second quarter, despite the increase in the revenues. It's that, as I mentioned before, the DIS contribution in terms of revenue, in terms of as well, profitability, in both for gross profit and also EBITDA, will weigh for three months instead of one month. So the weight is more oriented to the DIS, and the dilution will be more evident in the third quarter, rather than in the second. So if we consider that, and then I now preempt your next question, so how much is the profitability of DIS?
In the second quarter, so in the just 5 weeks of work, the contribution was in the region of 5% in terms of EBITDA for DIS standalone, so before any efficiency work, before any integration program... and this is what we expect also for the third quarter. But again, with a higher margin in terms of revenues, because we have to consider 3 times the revenues considered in the second quarter for DIS. So this is the main reason, almost the entire reason of the dilution between from the second quarter to the third quarter in terms of profitability. Then I hand over to Stefano-
Okay.
for the other questions.
Okay, so, let me understand. The first question is asking if we- the about products with higher marginality, right?
Yeah. Yes.
So the answer is, yes. I mean, we're constantly developing new products, and especially in the AI applications, as mentioned also in the previous calls, requires very difficult and complex probe cards from any point of view. So not only the probe heads, but all the components of the probe cards, yeah, are upgraded to the different level of complexity. So these give us the possibility really to also change our margins. Of course, at the beginning, it's when our yield is still lower because it's a new product, is less margin. But overall, the potential is much bigger because also we can charge more for more complex products.
And when our yield introduction is higher, that gives us the chance to increase our margins. So, then, you are asking about the socket market, final test market. So also, the market at this moment, as you know, is very fragmented with very small players, and which use more or less the same technology. There is not so much differentiation between them. So, but also in that case, and again, especially starting from the top players, especially in AI, also the technology for final test is becoming is going in the critical path. And not only the socket I'm talking about, but also about the PCB and whatever is around the final test board is becoming very critical.
So we see opportunities now with the DIS taking a good, let's say, track record right now in the on this. And on the socket part, our strategy, of course, has always been to leverage on our MEMS technologies. And so we are still developing technologies in order to be ready when they will be needed. So this is... So it can be an interesting potential market for the future. And you were asking about Intel? So-
Yeah, we are still in the region of 10% in terms of contribution to the revenues, so it's not lower than that. But the most important is that the higher capacity that is now addressed, is now available for us, has been addressed to other customers that now gained market share on us. And we were able to provide our capacity to them, progress to them, and this is the demonstration of the peak we had in the-
Yeah
... second quarter of 2024.
Yeah. So basically, unfortunately, and for the world, I mean, probably it's not good to have Intel, and so they're going down and... But of course, they have plans probably to come back. But it's only, it's not a market problem because you can see the other players that are not going up, actually, the competitors, Intel's competitors. So in our position, we are a very strong, very strong player. As said by Stefano, we are in very strong position as far as the market share for any of these players. And so again, with what we don't do on one side, that can be done on the other side.
So okay, thank you very much.
Thank you for this. Our next question now comes from Mr. Gianmarco Bonacina. Please, Gianmarco, the floor to you.
Yes, good afternoon, Gianmarco Bonacina from Equita. Couple of questions. The first one is if you can be a little bit more precise in telling us how much was the contribution of DIS in terms of revenues in the second quarter and inside your guidance for Q3? And the second one is if you can elaborate on the statement you put in the press release on the outlook where you talk about synergies for developing new products for final test boards. So also here, if you can give us a little bit of numbers also for next year, if you have in mind some contribution for these products.
Also, for DIS, you mentioned the 5% EBITDA margin. If you believe that this can be a floor and you can improve this for next year. Thank you.
Thank you, Gianmarco. So, first of all, a disclaimer is necessary here. Because as I mentioned several times before, also with several analysts and investors, the acquisition of DIS and Harbor as well, was driven to the complete integration of the business. So what we are trying now to display, to show you with more transparency as possible, is now a kind of segregation, segmentation of the revenues and the profitability that could be not so reliable in the future, at once all the business will be combined fully together. Because there will be a lot of correlations between the DIS business, the Technoprobe business, and Harbor business. So this is why we wanted, for transparency, to show now these numbers, because this is the first month of contribution.
So as I mentioned, DIS contributed in the first run of the business, in the first month, since 27 of May, until the end of June, for approximately EUR 11 million in terms of revenue, with an EBITDA in the region of 5%. So this is the contribution standalone. Going forward, all these numbers will be largely affected by intercompany transactions and profitability charges. So the profitability standalone will not indicate precisely the contribution of the business. If we have to show, if we have to think about a future contribution in our model, the DIS business would be back to what we expected once we made a due diligence of the business, so in the region of 15%.
15% EBITDA standalone, without considering the gain, all the synergies that we can do together. So, what I always say, just be careful when you want to segment all these kind of business, because they are not standalone business, they are all part of the same Technoprobe core business. In terms of new product, do you want to say a new product for next year, Stefano? Your question, Mr. Bonacina, was this your question about the new product for 2025? Mr. Bonacina?
Mr. Bonacina, can you hear us? Please remember to unmute your line.
Yeah, sorry. Yeah. No, the question was about expanding a little bit on your statement in the press release, where you talked about basically synergies that you can generate for interface design and fabrication, bringing new products, in particular, in final test board on the market. So if you can give us also some quantitative data about this statement for next year, thank you.
What I can tell you is about technology. It's difficult right now to give you a quantitative information. But what is clear that the complexity is reaching the point that is going to be very difficult for the standard suppliers to supply this type of boards. And the number of layers is reaching the limit. So here we're talking about reaching 100 layers for one PCB. So it's something that is only a handful number of suppliers, probably two or three in the, can do it, but with some difficulties.
So that's why this is coming our strategy and M&A strategy with the DIS and Harbor, and Technoprobe combined, to have a to improve the technology in order to to have this to to reach this kind of complexity with very good products. So the expectation here is for sure to start to see to the to to gain share, but I think we will be be ready to. We can talk probably about the numbers next in the next four quarters. Towards the end of this year.
Thank you.
Thank you. We now have a question from Florian Sager. Please, Florian, the floor to you.
Thanks. Thanks for letting me on. Yeah, it's Florian Sager from Stifel. I got three questions, one on the financials. And that would be, you mentioned sort of a growth target, or you see yourself on track for growth in 2024. Just wanted to clarify, is that an internal target that you have, or is that something that you could quantify for us as well? And then the second question would be, if you have any updates on the timeline of maybe an HBM test product for us, maybe potentially with a partner. And the third question would be that there have been some notes that suggest that test times on Blackwell could be twice that of previous generations, which could have implications for the number of probe cards needed. Can you confirm this?
Or, yes, that's not what you're hearing. Thanks.
Thank you. Let me start with the first question about the growth for 2024. So what we show for Q3 is a very moderate growth compared to the second quarter, so still a sequential growth. But what we want to to already address everyone is that what we foresee for the rest of the year is confirmed with a more remarkable growth, especially in the last quarter. So we used to say we were in the region of low single-digit growth for the year end, but now our estimate to a mid-double-digit growth overall. So this is one of the, let me say, problem that we have in our business when we talk about quarter estimates.
So in our business, delivering a product at the end of one month rather than the first day of the subsequent month, could change the quarter, and this is what happened already in the second quarter compared to the first one. Once we have a peak in the second quarter, just for a delivery on the cutoff date. And the same will happen between the end of the third quarter and the beginning of the Q4. So we expect a significant delivery across those dates. So it's just a matter of timing, once, when you have to recognize revenues. So this is not so relevant for us as an industrial. For us, it's more important the full-year view, the six months, nine months view, even if still uncertain.
But what we see in the short term is that some big delivery or significant delivery will happen just at the beginning of the Q4. So that's why we believe that revenues in the quarter will be slightly higher, and not slightly higher, but higher than Q3 and the second quarter as well, allowing us to reach a more remarkable growth at the year end, so in, as I said before, in the mid-double-digit area.
Okay, I'll take the second and third question. About the HBM, for us, it's talking about the memory market, of course, it's the most interesting market, and we are already engaging with the qualification process with the main players, all the main players. And we are, again, in qualification process. So we expect to have some updates, some news by, let's say, Q1 next year, and then we can start to give you more, some also some forecast about business. But the, the...
What I want to highlight is that it's a very interesting market for us, because the HBM is not compared to the other memory chips, it's much more difficult for testing, and it requires different technology compared to standard memory technologies for probe card. And here is where we can add our contribution, because of course SOC, there's typically the SOC testing is more difficult, require better technology, more complex technology, and the HBM is going toward that direction. So basically, it's a very good fit for us. It's a difficult type of a chip to be tested, require different technologies, so also the actual say probe card players are going—they need to develop something else to in order to follow the roadmap.
And so here we come with our technologies from the SOC, which typically are more advanced, okay? So this is for sure, it's a very interesting target for us. And about your last question about the Blackwell chip, so probably you have more, you can get more information for also directly from NVIDIA, from their plans. But what we can see that for sure there is an acceleration in the development of those type of chips. They are in the past, probably you were going to see one chip every few years. Now, they follow the... we start to see the same type of cadence of like once per year, with increasing volumes every year by year.
So it's still early to say exactly if we'll double the number or what the exact volume, but expectation will be higher, for sure higher volume than previous generation.
Thank you for this. We now have a question from Oliver Wong. Please, Oliver, the floor to you. Please, Oliver, remember to unmute your line. Thank you.
Hi, good afternoon. Thanks for taking my question. So given how the scope for sort of, you know, adjusting M&A has affected recent results, I was wondering if I could get some clarification on you know, organic versus the growth, including the M&A adjustments for fiscal year 2024. So you mentioned you're expecting to grow by mid-double digits for the fiscal year. Does that exclude M&A contribution? And I was also wondering how that affects the gross margins. Thank you.
... That's correct. So we are excluding now any M&A project that we increase our revenue by the year end. So everything that we have estimated for the year end is now internal growth, organic growth, given to the growth, the market, the market share, and our volumes for the production. And we believe that these will grow, which may grow also our profitability compared to the first half of the year, of course.
Thank you. We now have a question from the phone number ending in 249. Please, the floor to you. Please remember to unmute your line, as I can still see that you're on mute. Okay, then we will come back to you. For now, we will move on to Mr. Luca Bacoccoli. Please, Luca, the floor to you. Luca, can you hear us? Okay. So, currently, it seems like we're having some issues with these two people, but we will come back to them if there are any further questions.
No.
No. Then, oh, I can still see that Luca's put his hand up. Please, Luca, you're on muted. You need to speak if you want to hear us. Okay then, at the moment, we do not have any further questions, but we will wait just a few moments to give everyone the opportunity to ask a question. I see now that we have a further question from Didier Scemama. Please, the floor to you. Okay, he has now put his hand down. So in this case, there are currently no further questions. We will wait just a few moments to give everyone the opportunity to ask a question. I see that there is now a hand up from a phone number ending in 171. Please, the floor to you. Remember to unmute your line. Can you hear us? Okay.
Then in this case, I kindly ask you to just send your questions by email, as currently you are not able to speak. I will then hand back to the speakers for any final comments.
Can you hear me?
Oh, yes. Now we can hear you. Thank you.
Okay. It's Domenico Ghilotti from Equita. My first question is, if you can give us more color on how do you see the automotive and industrial market in the second half of the year? Then, a clarification on the organic growth for the third quarter, because if I'm not wrong, you said that you are expecting revenues from DIS three times this second quarter, so in the area of EUR 33 million. So this would mean an organic decline in the high single digit area. Just to understand if I got it correctly. And last question on artificial intelligence.
In 2023, if I'm not wrong, your exposure was about 10%, which is the half of 20% of AI and data center. Just wondering if you can provide us an updated target on your 2024 revenue figures. Thank you.
Okay. Starting from automotive. So right now, so we see, according to our main clients, 2024 will be impacted by a significant inventory correction in industrial and automotive and slowdown, because slowdown a little bit. So this is a situation, but this is. We are not. The good point is that we, we're not losing any market share. We're still the number one amplifier suppliers for most of the automotive players. So we just have to wait for the market to pick up again.
For the contribution of DIS, yes, I mentioned three times because it was one month compared to three months. So it's not exactly 3x , it's not a mathematical impact. There is a bit of seasonality in the third quarter of 2024. In general, third quarter is the weakest quarter of the year, especially for the business of DIS. So we expect a contribution between, let me say, EUR 25 million and EUR 30 million, and that will really depend on the intercompany transaction that we'll be able to address, or through DIS or through Technoprobe directly. So it will depend, it will depend on the interactions that within the group.
Overall, we can estimate in terms of Euro between EUR 25 million and EUR 30 million. Roughly 3x the contribution of the second quarter for the revenue. About the AI contribution, so I think we can expect to be in the range, around 20% of 2024, of our revenue.
Thank you for this. We will now try to give the word back to Didier Scemama, who tried to speak before. Please remember to unmute your line so that we can all hear you.
Hi, can you hear me now?
Yes.
Now we can hear you.
Ah, brilliant. Okay. Now, I just wanted to come back to the point on organic growth for the full-year, mid-double-digit. So first of all, does that mean, like, something like 20%, something like that? And is that for the probe card business for the full-year, e.g., excluding the DIS and Harbor acquisitions, or does that include those two acquisitions as well?
It will include all the acquisition.
Okay, and 20% is the right ballpark, is it?
20% would have been high double digits, so we said mid-double digits.
Okay, so mid-double-digit included, including your M&A? Okay.
Yeah.
All right. Thank you very much. That's very clear.
Thank you for this. Currently, we do not have any questions queued, so we will wait just a few moments to give everyone the opportunity to ask a question. As there are no further questions, I will now hand back to the speakers for any final comments before bringing this presentation to a close. Thank you. Please go ahead.
Thank you, everyone, and we'll talk again in the next three months. Thank you so much, and have a good day, everyone.