Welcome to our earnings call for the first quarter of 2026. My name is Bettina Schäfer, I'm responsible for investor relations at LPKF. I'm pleased to be joined today by our CEO, Klaus Fiedler, and our CFO, Peter Mümmler. Klaus and Peter will walk you through the business development of the first three months and provide an outlook for the current year. After that, we will open the floor for your questions in a Q&A session. The conference will be recorded and published for a period of two weeks on our website. Before we begin, please note that today's discussion may contain forward-looking statements. These statements are based on current assumptions and are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially. We do not undertake any obligation to update these forward-looking statements except as required by law.
With that, I would like to hand over to Klaus Fiedler.
Thank you very much, Bettina. Hello, and welcome everybody to our Q1 results. I'm gonna start with walking you through the key takeaways, latest market and business developments, and a special focus about the latest developments in the advanced packaging field and our positioning. Let's get started. Performance for Q1, a solid start into 2026 in, of course, a volatile macro environment. We had a strong order intake in our development and electronic sector, resulting in a total book-to-bill of 1.4. We have, and that will be for the full year, a weak year in the solar field due to the technology transition to perovskites. Basically we are running on track against our planning also in that business field. In advanced packaging, and I'll have more on that in later slides, the business is progressing as expected.
We have a very good positioning in that field, meaning we are used for prototyping at multiple semiconductor customers. This is a year where the first CapEx will be positioned now for true production purposes, which is a very important milestone for us. We received a first order for capacity expansions already in Q1 from a Korean customer, and we are in advanced talks with several customers for their production ramp-up orders. We see the business progressing as we expected. Regarding our product roadmap, as announced before, we wanna see our LIDE process as an entry ticket into this market, and we definitely wanna broaden our portfolio to become a strategically relevant player in that large and growing market.
We are now offering additional process steps in glass singulation, in laser bonding of multilayer glass stacks, which are driven by customer needs because we are in intensive exchange about the needs with a lot of players in this market. We are also in co-packaged optics here at a very different timing. This is R&D in exchange with several customers to basically sound the market and enter a positioning phase from 2027 onwards. What do we see as demand trends for Q1 in the market? We see a noticeable pickup in demand in rapid prototyping, and that is to a relevant part also driven by the defense industry and also in SMT, where we see a gradual easing now of the investment restraint we saw in 2025 due to the tariff situation.
We had a very strong uptick in order entry in the SMT field in Q1. Regarding operations, we are transforming the company in both solar and welding. For 2026, we see a challenging year, as mentioned, in solar due to the shift in perovskites. We definitely see that the perovskites open a perspective that it's the right business decision to accept a challenging 2026. In the North Star program, Peter will talk more about it later, we are on track in reducing fixed cost, improving profitability. For example, we ramped down our production in our third site now and are now working on a footprint of three production sites to leverage synergies and reduce costs. Our outlook in 2026 guidance is unchanged.
We basically guide cautiously here. We do not bake in bulk orders from advanced packaging, while clearly seeing that this is a year where we will receive the relevant purchase orders to make clear that LPKF is not just a technology partner for this market, but the true production partner for our customers. Next slide, please. Couple of more details on the market situation. Semiconductor industry continues the transformation towards glass-based substrates and TGVs in the back end. It's now much more tangible with players also now making their operation model clear, making their volume scenarios clear. It's clearly in line with our estimations. In the overall trend, we see the total addressable market going up. Simply because the wafer starts and the market demand specifically for AI is going up. This basically linearly translates into demand for our product.
As mentioned, increasing market activity, which we see in order entry, in rapid prototyping, and in electronics, partly driven by delayed projects which we actually expected in 2025, which are now coming through CapEx being released, us receiving the POs. Also we see, that won't surprise anybody, an uptick in defense investments which we benefit from. Solar market, a weak investment year. We see investments in prototyping equipment, in trial lines for perovskites, we participate in that. We see that the industry is not ready yet for high volume ramps in perovskites, while no longer investing in cadmium telluride, that makes it a weak year, which we also planned for in the solar sector.
We also see intensifying competition, not from Western players, but especially in China, where we are positioning ourselves also in product offering and cost structure to continue to be successful in China. Overall operating environment, persistent volatility. We have the Iran situation as a new one coming up, geopolitical tension, fragile supply chains. A continued environment with rapid changes. Our start into our year confirms that we are on track to our planning. Business development, advanced packaging. For me, the positioning phase is over, and a dominant part of the players in this large and growing industry has selected LPKF as their partner for prototyping, so for technology. The focus is shifting. The focus is now clearly on winning the first orders for true production assets, a very more important milestone for LPKF.
The focus is on defending our IP, which is by and large respected in the market. There are certain regions where we see people obviously infringing on our IP, and there we also have already taken the relevant legal actions. Again, for those who are not yet deep into this field, our IP is visible in the final product, so we can defend our IP in a very tangible way, and that's what we are doing. Of course, the focus, and I'll talk a little bit more about it later, is on broadening now our product portfolio. Using LIDE and our excellent customer contacts now as an entry ticket, but basically offering across the whole production chain the processes where we have strong USPs and see a tangible pain point in the market.
Rapid prototyping, strong overall demand, but more than expected driven by Asia, while the U.S. hardly related to, how shall I say, constant government shutdown disruptions and lower planability than usual, U.S. being a bit weaker than expected, but compensated by a strong Asia demand. Electronics, strong overall demand. We need to keep that track. Basically now getting deals that were delayed from 2025, plus the additional 2026 demand. Welding, very weak automotive market as expected. We see orders from consumer electronics and specifically a nice bulk order from Smart Robotics, giving us the foundation that the restructuring of that business makes sense, and we can get back on a growth path. Solar, weak orders, but expectedly, so nothing that is deviating from our plan, and uncertainty with Chinese competition that makes it a very weak solar year.
With the perovskite transition as a very good opportunity, we definitely are convinced it's the right decision to bear that weak year and reap the benefits in the coming years. With that, Peter, a couple of words on operations.
Thanks, Klaus. North Star. North Star. We are on track, as Klaus mentioned already, with North Star. The first wave, we must say, really successful on time. We ramped down the production in Fürth, and it's finalized. It's closed. With all elements, personnel will be end of this month will be gone, and we have a successful start in Suhl. Very good start in North Star. For North Star, we targeting still sustainable double-digit, even margin 2028. That reason is not over North Star. We keep going on this. We still have a road to go for this year to close further gaps. The clear target is the double-digit for 2028, and I'm looking positive in this direction that we keep going with the North Star and getting the cost reduction materialized.
What we're doing, and this is really the specific, is focusing our resources on the most attractive growth markets. We have growth markets. Klaus comes later a little bit in our advanced packaging area. We need to invest. It's the balancing North Star, looking at the growth markets, investing further, but keep going on the cost reduction that we're getting more resilient to the revenue changes we have. Very, very good news is we finalized in February, in quarter one, a new financing agreement with our existing banks and the consortium that we can secure our complete transformation and restructuring and the future investment in our innovative technologies, secured until 2028. We're very happy.
Gives us a stable base where we can now really plan and execute all our planned stuff we have to. There I can hand over to Klaus.
Thank you very much, Peter. Let's talk a little bit more in details about what's going on in the advanced packaging field with glass as a new packaging material, specifically driven by AI and high-performance computing. Those who were listening in to our investor relations call or to our quarterly reports before know we have been positioning ourself in this market over years. It's not easy as a new player to become a viable supplier to the semicon industry. That was a multi-year process. Where we stand is that a significant number of players have positioned themself in this new market, both established players and people who takes this disruption as a chance to enter that market. Over 80% of these customers have been buying LPKF equipment to qualify their processes, to get the yield to acceptable level.
We now see the time that a handful of these players, four or five players, are at the technical and yield level now to make their first ramp-up investments. That's happening here and now. If you follow the press, you see announcements about factories being built, about groundbreaking and so on. It's becoming very tangible. For us, the positioning phase is basically over in that field, and now the phase is to win the production orders, to become a credible, viable player that benefits now from the first ramp-up phase and then the high-volume phase. Definitely right now to use the chance to not be a one-trick pony but be a true partner across the whole process chain. Of course, we also need to monitor closely where competition is standing.
It's actually very rare that such a large new market opens up for a company with laser technology, so a lot of players have basically their ambitions in that market. We are monitoring very closely. We continue to see that we have both a multi-year head start in just the maturity of our equipment. Don't forget, we have several dozens in the field who, over multiple years, have proven their performance. We have a strong IP position. This IP position is visible in the project, in the product, so we can very much point the finger on if somebody is trying to basically infringe on our claims. We also very much know and want this not to be a single-source market. It's too big for single source from risk profile also of our customers. We are observing who positions themselves. We see companies in Korea.
We also see German company positioning themselves. That's good. Those guys also respect our IP position. We see local manufacturers in China, where I can't always say that the respect for IP position is given. We simply get immediately active in that field and take legal measures here because this is a global market, and freedom to operate a clear IP-free position is very important for the customer, so IP has punch. As mentioned, LIDE is nothing but an entry ticket. We want to become a strategic player in that field, and we took the relevant actions. Next slide, please.
If you look at our webpage from time to time, you see that we are now promoting a whole product line called Nexa, which includes our LIDE systems but also systems for ablation, so for basically cutting, singulating the ABF layer in such a package, and also a system for glass-glass or glass-silicon bonding. We brought all three in the market now, of course based on our deep customer insights, where the customer has need and where he actually is looking for a partner to provide these process steps to him.
We see a good market pull here, and that is an excellent opportunity for us now to basically immediately position ourselves as LPKF is the company, whenever it comes to glass in advanced packaging, that you talk to and basically get in the roadmap discussions at the table to shape up the whole process and production chain. These three are tangible right now. We know what the market need is. We have a good estimate on the relevant timing. We, of course, are also active in, for us, the natural next step in this industry, and that is co-packaged optics. Optical communication between the individual components in a high-performance computing package, but that clearly is at a timeline that is years later than those three technologies. Next slide. If we look how we see the market right now and what will happen over the next years.
2026 positioning phase, there I basically made a check mark. Our positioning is above our targets, measured by how many customers selected LPKF equipment for their process qualification. We will now enter a ramp-up phase in 2027 and 2028. Our expectation is that first players will position and place their ramp-up purchase orders this year to install and ramp up in 2027. That is, of course, glass structuring, so our LIDE equipment. Also in the same process flow, our Tensor Ablation of the ABF layer. This ramp-up, we expect will take a year before target yields are reached that customers can take the next step and go into true high-volume orders. We see a ramp-up phase in 2027 and 2028. It can be faster, the whole thing will be pulled in. It can be slower, it will be a little pushed out.
Don't forget, we were ready with our process step a year ago, more than a year ago. Very large sizable players in this market took a very long time to get to the yield level where they are right now. It's a brand-new technology, so we should be realistic in the expectation how long it will take for them to get to their target yield. We are prepared for any scenario here. We see the high volume phase then in 2029 and 2030, with POs coming in usually six to nine months earlier. The volume potential, we are just updating our market model because the overall demand is actually going upwards. The number of wafer starts get corrected upwards permanently, so we need to update also our TAM assessments.
Tensor Bonding, from what we learned in the market, is highly attractive for the customers, but will not be in the initial ramp-up products. It will be delayed by about a year. That's more for, let's say, the second generation of designs, but fits perfectly into the demand profile here. In our market model, we shifted that now by a year, and my expectation is POs also for Tensor Ablation for production purposes, we can get in this year. Tensor Bonding, we will sample a lot, but true sales of this equipment, I see more in 2027. Co-packaged optics, as communicated, we are in a market assessment phase. For us, it's obvious that glass will be used as a LIDE guide, as a wave guide for the next generation of architectures in semicon packaging. A lot of different technology approaches are floating around.
We are first assessing where we see winning processes. We do that over the whole year, talking to the same customers where we have good insights and relation now due to LIDE, due to glass packaging. We will enter a positioning phase in 2027, 2028. On an R&D level, we are highly active already right now, also together with customers. We see here that ramp-ups for co-packaged optics will be more in the 2029, 2030 timeframe. This strategy we are executing now, you can measure us against winning true production orders for ramp up this year because that's an important milestone that proves that LPKF is not only a technology partner, but a true operational partner for our customers. With that, I hand over to Peter, who will give you a lot more details on the numbers now.
Thanks, Klaus. Going to the financials in Q1 . Overall, I must say the Q1 runs at our plan and our expectations. When we look at the development, the revenue compared to previous year reduced by 32%, majorly driven or driven by solar business. What was clear now in our plan and what we are expecting for the fiscal year. Adjusted EBIT minus 68% to previous year. Here you can see the positive impact already from North Star. When we just see the revenue reduction by closely to EUR 8 million and go down, and you see an impact of roughly EUR 2 million in the profitability. There you can see that we have cost reduction measures planned, that this hit in the reduction of the revenue is really mitigated, strongly mitigated.
Positive trend here. Incoming orders plus 18%. Very good story. Book-to-bill rate bigger than 1.4. We're growing, despite we are lacking of our solar business here. Strong businesses in development and electronics on the side. Development of cash flow as expected, - 73%. Here we have the reduction of the revenue, we're getting an impact. We have one-time costs here for our restructuring efforts in there too. What I mentioned in the beginning that we ramped down significant personnel and in [Fürth] is in the range what we see, what we're expecting here. Orders on hand, compared to last year, we are 26% below. There were still certain solar business in there.
The trend is that we're growing our order on hands again due to the book-to-bill rate. Overall still a good development. Employees, total numbers, - 5% compared to first year. This is, yeah, no stop. We're seeing it. It goes more and more in the direction that we're going further, reducing our workforce to get more efficiency in there and pulling those synergies. Going to the next slide. There we can see the working capital development. Inventory increased by 18% compared to last year. I mean, we know in our planning, we have in the Q2 , we ramping up our revenue. This is already a preparation of revenue re-ramp up.
We have some small amounts here on unfinished goods in there, where we just plan to deliver in Q1 , but due to logistics and, you know what in the world market is right now with logistics. A good development in trade receivables. The contract liabilities, increase of 66% is driven by advanced payments due to our higher order income, what we have in our books. It's the major impact here, what we have here. Trade payables follows a little bit the business, the quarter one, lower revenue in this direction.
Overall, when we see that we have a negative trend of the working capital by about EUR 1 million, but when we see the development of all our business, it's still a very good performance, I must say, in our asset management we're having right now with in the company. Going to the next slide. Here you can see our business. What Klaus mentioned, some trends already. When we look at electronics, we're at a stable market here. No significant growth. There's some impact of previous year in the revenue. We keep it stable. The reduction of 70% compared to previously an adjusted EBIT of EUR 400,000, it's slightly driven that we keep investing in our leading technology here.
As you can see here, this is a slight impact. Development had a strong Q1, I must say. A growth of 9%, and significant growth of the profitability due to the growth of, majorly driven by the revenue. Very positive, we see the developing. Klaus mentioned there's a bulk order in there from Smart Robotics here. We are happy to won this contract. A growth of 21%. Very good direction in the impact in the adjusted EBIT. We could not give it because we have certain costs to secure the development and the delivery of the equipment. In Q1, we have some certain investments. We kept the profitability of this business stable.
As I said, it is exactly planned because we saw already that we have a certain investment to stabilize the delivery performance of the business in the Q1 . You can see finally with solar, this is a dramatic picture, I must say, but it was seen. This investment of the perovskites, that really the investment goes down in the industry for this, for the fiscal year 2026. This you can see dramatically reduction of revenue by 88%. When small revenue of EUR 1.3 million in the Q1 , it's really dramatic. When we're looking on the profitability side, we did a lot of special action items in the solar business to keep the impact in the EBIT as low as possible, short-time working.
I must say, very successful countermeasures in the solar business right now. That's ending up at minus EUR 1.6 million. Overall, as I mentioned, the summary, Q1 is in our plan in the area where we expected. We're looking now for the next quarter to grow. The handover to Klaus.
Good. Guidance for the year unchanged. In the big picture, what do we expect from our product lines? We see in the semicon market that now the transition to operational business is happening, positioning good. That's clearly our focus field for strategic growth, and that's clearly our focus field for strategic broadening of our portfolio. This is the focus of our company, and this is definitely where we see all the read points on track. Next read point very clearly showing all of you true production ramp-up orders out of that field this year. SMT and rapid prototyping, we see solid growth prospects in that field. The mega trend of replacing legacy technology, milling, stamping by modern laser technology is intact. We see the need for rapid prototyping, confidentiality, defense business, and fast design cycles intact. Of course, we are exposed to macroeconomic factors.
We saw that in 2025, the tariffs definitely didn't help. We got to monitor how the Iran situation affect the overall business, but we are definitely having all hands on deck to countersteer on the cost side in that field. Solar, as mentioned, we have a current weakness. This will be the weakest solar year for a decade in investments for us. We very clearly see perovskites being addressed globally with a very high R&D effort, and we see our positioning. We think it's absolutely the right business decision to accept a weak year and grab the opportunities ahead of us. Welding, yes, strategic realignment happening as we speak. Our expectations for the automotive market are very moderate, but we are making the right steps and see the market traction. In the fields we are focusing now on consumer, medical, Smart Robotics.
Of course, it requires a complete restructuring of the cost structure of this business area. That is far progressed now. Basically, the main steps, including operational consolidation, are done. The midterm aspiration is grab the opportunities at hand in the semicon market, which we were preparing for many years, and structure our core business units in a way that we can grab the opportunity, but clearly improve the profitability and resilience, flexibility to be ready in a market that is basically now defined by constant volatility. I basically want to hand back to Bettina for your Q&A.
Thank you very much, Klaus. We are now ready for your questions. You can write your questions into the chat, or you can give me a hand signal in order to speak directly. If you are calling from a phone, please press star nine to raise your hand and star six in order to unmute yourself. The first question comes from APUS Capital, Johannes Ries, I guess. I have unmuted you.
Yes, good morning. First, maybe astonishing share price development. Funny that you talked years about a topic and now it's seen by the market, it's astonishing. Anyway, maybe coming to this hot topic, semiconductors, you mentioned the market size. Can you give us a feeling maybe for LIDE and also for ablation and bonding, what market size you see maybe if you come to the mass production and what is the maybe the size difference between ramping and mass production? Is this factor one to five, one to 10, only to have some feeling?
Of course, Mr. Ries. Basically what we are doing right now, and we will finish it within this quarter, we are currently consolidating all the latest market figures about the high-performance computing market and the glass share. I gave you my addressable market numbers before, which is about EUR 0.5 billion split into interposer and as a dominant part glass core. Please have a couple of weeks of patience that I come with sound, solid, updated numbers in that field. What I can tell you that the number of wafer starts for high-performance computing is ticking up in the latest projections by analysts, by banks significantly. This is a positive factor for us. There are various scenarios out there for how fast will glass now be adopted and basically gain its share in the overall HPC advanced packaging market.
What I'm seeing and what my assumption is, several players will release their POs for ramp-up production assets this year. Another group of players need still a bit more time to reach that maturity level. They will maybe place the same orders in 2027. Those people who are placing orders now, I know where they are. They are now at the level that they can ramp because the market wants a product, but they are not at yields, and therefore total cost that is at their target level. They will need time now to run the whole production chain, and for what it's worth, I gotta say no, it's not us. Our process step yields are excellent, but it's a whole process chain.
If they get fast to their target yields, the whole share of glass and the high volume phase will be coming earlier. If they take more than a year to get to their target level, the share, and therefore also the high volume phase will be on the lower side before they reach that level. That's a key impact factors I see. My expectation is several players over the coming quarters positioning first ramp-up volume orders. They will not be dramatic. They will buy a handful of machines each and just run the whole production chain. When they go to the full orders, and this amount is ticking up what they need, this will depend on the ramp-up performance. I hope that answers your question, Mr. Ries. You know the market very well, I know.
Maybe one or two follow-up first. What is the maybe if the mass production is coming, then you mentioned in the ramp-up, is it a couple of machines per customer? Is it then in the figure of 50 or 100 per customer, or what?
In the high volume, yes. Yes, it is.
Okay. This EUR 0.5 Billion you mentioned, which maybe has to move up, does that includes the classic and LIDE leader business and also ablation and bonding?
No. Ablation and bonding will be on top.
Okay.
Just to give you figures, we are really in deep discussions with customers on throughputs and all that stuff now. Our first ballpark estimate of addressable market for the ablation is EUR 100 million.
Mm-hmm.
It's attractive, but it's of course much lower than what we can achieve with LIDE. That's not the key point for me. It's really for me very important to now go out and be more than a one-trick pony. Go broad. My customer wants to buy more from me because it's very unusual that a small company like LPKF gets a place in the semicon supply chain. Basically, what my customer is telling me, "Okay, fair enough, you're in now. What else can you do for me?
Right.
I don't wanna buy one process step from a supplier. I wanna buy a lot from you. I gotta give them the right offerings, and that's why we go broad right now.
Bonding is the same like ablation, or is it a larger market? I think it's larger, huh, in that case.
For the bonding, no, I don't want to give you a number. We know it's large enough to be worth our while.
Mm-hmm.
There we are really currently with the customers and their architectures in deep discussions, and we haven't finished that yet. I don't want to give you a number and correct it three months later.
Okay.
Please be a bit patient.
Same for the CPO market, which is far, more far away.
Yeah. No, again, we are in a market assessment phase. We are firmly convinced when you have glass in an advanced package, it will be used as a LIDE guide. That's our working assumption. Nobody wastes space in a semicon package. There are so many architectures still out and so many technology ideas. We first gotta assess. We have the access to the customers now. They like talking to us. We first gotta assess which architectures consolidate towards, "Oh, that could go into mass production." Then we position ourselves with the right process steps. It's too early to give you a market size here. If you want, there are analyst research papers out on the size of co-packaged optics. It's huge.
Right.
For a bottom-up calculation, not mature enough. I wanna get the right facts and figures first.
Fully understandable. Maybe my usual question because foldable screens you have not given up because you said no word on this? It's still going on?
Basically, where are we? Yes, we have our partner who is pitching the technology in the market. He gives me regular updates. I have a certain installed base of capacity, but I'm basically not seeing a hockey stick ahead of me.
Mm-hmm.
Again, it was a development also paid by my partner in Korea. Yes, I complain, but not too loudly. I definitely also see that they are pushing getting it into the next phone designs. For me at the moment, not a focus area because I'm not the one developing the market and winning the customers.
I see.
Basically for me, focus on where you can really make a difference now, and that's advanced packaging.
It's still a option, you could say.
Yeah, yeah. It's alive. It's being offered in the market. From what I hear, I am just back from Korea, yeah, unsurprisingly the legacy technology is not willing to just die. They are fighting back very hard. We have to be patient in getting market absorption here.
Okay. on the solar business.
Yeah.
Perovskite. What holding back perovskites apart that it's not ramping up, how long it could last before it's really market ready? Is it next year? What is the technology hurdle, huh?
For what it's worth, my personal feeling, perovskites in the lab work awesome. That's why everybody has dollar signs in their eyes. It would be a big efficiency boost for solar cells and a total game changer in the solar industry. Getting them technology-wise ready, perovskites are super sensitive to humidity, oxygen, whatever.
Mm.
Making a stable solar cell that you can put somewhere in a solar farm and it produces for 10+ years, that's a very different challenge than getting it to work in the lab. They're basically very big players, both in the U.S. and China, are throwing a ton of engineering and R&D resources on to figure out exactly this stability questions. That's it, stability. Zero-hour performance is awesome. Stability is where it's at. My personal assumption is it will take until 2028 that this is ready for volume ramp-up. My target is to still sell the factory equipment for the first perovskite factories in 2027. It's hard in 2026. You saw the figures. We are missing, like, EUR 10 million in one quarter because this business is at the moment slow. We hang in there.
For good reasons, I stand behind it, but we can't do that for two years. I'm working also with my customers on, "Look, you need me, I need you. I can do it for one year, but I can't do it for two." We gotta make it that we sell again as we did for years and years in 2027, and the ramp up then happens in 2028. That's my working assumption.
Okay. Final question, then I go back in the queue. On welding, this Smart Robotics is also a hot topic and a large offer. Could share come more, and could we expect welding, or we had a lot of exceptional costs associated, therefore maybe, at least reach break even next year?
Yes, absolutely. That otherwise we wouldn't do it. I mean, such a restructuring costs a lot of money and a lot of brain share. Yes, we absolutely believe that it can be put back on a growth path, but it's a tough change from an industry that was living well with automotive for decades.
Yeah.
Suddenly to say, "Oh my God, party's over. Focus on something new." We are convinced we can do it, but it takes a drastic restructuring. Of course, it needs to bear its own costs at a minimum next year.
Okay. Robotics could be, also, is it a one trick thing or could more, is more to come maybe?
God, now I gotta be careful with NDAs.
Okay.
All I can say is my customer has plans that are humongous. We take it in a more conservative approach.
Mm-hmm.
I'm very happy about this order because it positions ourselves very well, and it makes a difference as a good foundation for building in a year where basically it's definitely not a bull market in many other markets they are addressing.
Okay. A great answer, but a new opportunity. Thanks a lot for all these answers, good work so far. Looking ahead also there's the beauty things and also the triple digit maybe growth from the new revenue from the new areas. Thanks a lot.
Yes. It will be very interesting quarterly calls this year. You can believe me. It's a very hot phase. We'll keep in touch, Mr. Ries. Next question, please.
Thank you very much, Mr. Ries. The next question comes from Malte Schaumann. Yes. Mr. Schaumann? Mr. Schaumann?
Hello? Yep.
Yeah. We can hear you.
Hi. first question is on also on LIDE. with the first customers moving today for the first volume or this year with the first orders for the low volume production, what's the risk in your eyes that customers might be late or not late, but might be delayed in getting yields to a sufficient level to then follow up with the ramp next year? What's the risk in your eyes that this might be delayed by two, four, three, four quarters into 2028?
What I can tell you is the process steps where we take ownership now, definitely the structuring but also the ablation process, no risk. We have all the numbers to show we are at excellent yields. There are other process steps that were holding us back in 2025, as you well know, and what I know is that they are now at yield levels where they say, "Okay, we can ramp. We can start." The risk, it exists. I can't give you numbers even though I know them, that they say, "Oh my God, we are getting better step by step," but this is still not the target yields that a semicon backend process expects.
I would still expect, because the end customer, the OEMs, they want the product, that they would expand capacity at a more, let's say, moderate pace until they have the yields under control. Looking at how long it took these guys to get to the level where they can finally ramp, I don't expect that they get to target yield faster than a year from starting with, let's say, ramp-up capacity. If it's faster, I'm happy. It's upside. That's my expectation. They turn it on, they take a year, and then they are ready for the higher volume POs.
Okay, good. On welding with the demand you're currently seeing consumer electronics, Smart Robotics, would you say that there's chance that 2026 might turn out a bit better than initially expected?
No. I'm happy if I make plan for 2026 because, yes, there are some upside opportunities, some things running better. Don't forget that this whole Iran situation, so far we don't see anything relevant. Yes, we see far higher logistics costs, but they are usually covered by our customers. If I look at the potential of the Iran situation disrupting global economies, I would not plan for upside right now. Just make the plan. That's my target here. Focus on the cost and structural part because that we can influence.
Okay. Another one online. What's the risk or is there a risk that customers who now enter low volume production this year, that one of these might not follow up with higher volume production next year as all these customers or some customers might chase the same volume orders from their customers? Is there risk in that sense? Or do you think that market volumes, product volumes are sufficient to support a higher volume or the ramp-up at all of the customers you're now supplying with some tools?
Hey. Oh, God, now I need to find the right diplomatic answer. As you know, we are working with a high number of customers, and it's definitely a double-digit number. They all identified that very large addressable market. They all have their ambitions. What is the probability that all of them are successful? Low. Yes, out of this group of a two-figure amount of people who start with good ambitions here, several will make it, but some will not. For me, it's important to serve all of them to a great quality level, and then they can do their business. For me, the total addressable market and my share in this market is what counts. I don't think that it will distribute over a double-digit number of customers, but that there will be five, six companies in the world who distribute that market among themselves.
That's where I get my high volume POs. Yes, there will be some who say, "Oh, maybe I started too late," or, "Maybe I didn't figure out that technology process as well as my competitors," and they will retreat.
Yep. Okay. Many thanks.
Thank you very much. Are there any further questions? If so, please give me a hand signal so that I can unmute you. I can't see any hand signals, and there is nothing in the chat at the moment. Which might mean, Klaus and Peter, that you have answered it all.
Okay. believe me.
No, there's something.
It's a hot pace, so next quarter we meet in February.
No, I think we can.
Klaus, Klaus, wait.
Okay.
Let's just see. Follow-up. Current share price levels look attractive. How do you think about raising equity to de-risk, bridge the potential time gap until technology adoption happens, and improve your market position with increased investments?
What we are definitely looking at as we speak and constantly, do we see an external partner that we could take into our fold to basically broaden our offering in the overall field of advanced packages here and now? If we find the right target, then definitely, raising equity to finance such an acquisition would be definitely something we would envision. We do not have the ambition, Peter and me right now, to say, "Oh, we basically get ourself external financing to bridge the gap until LIDE has the revenue level that we can show a attractive double-digit EBIT." We are focusing on basically completely updating our whole structure of LPKF to make it future-proof, to make it resilient, and to be, from our whole structure, ready for the permanent volatility of that world.
Our target is not to raise capital for bridging a certain time period, but raising capital for an acquisition if the right one comes along and fits our overall strategy in that field. That's something, yes, we can envision.
Must say, adding to Klaus' comments is when our financing we sign in quarter one now, it's a frame. This gives us the potential to invest in certain areas even for the LIDE growth. For this we don't have, even for unexpected growth, not a challenge to raise capital in this area.
Thank you, Peter. I see another question on ARRALYZE. Just a quick update. You know, we were winding down our internal activities on ARRALYZE. That's done. We still have a core team on board, and we are talking to external partners to basically continue this activity in an external entity because our learning is, oh, the product is actually good and attractive, but market access on our side and also, let's say, willingness to absorb in the current market where, especially in the U.S. and in academic funding in the U.S. we are in a very tough timeframe for those guys. That was too costly and too lengthy for us as LPKF to say, "Let's just go through." Yes, these talks are happening as we speak, and our clear ambition is continue the activity, but not within LPKF, but within an external entity.
I also expect to give you updates in the course of the year when I say, "Oh, milestone is reached.
I can't see any further hand signals at the moment. If you have any further questions, please raise your hand or type it into the chat. No further questions, I think.
Okay.
In that case, I would like to thank you all very much for joining this call, and our next regular earnings call will take place on the July 23rd, at the release of our Q2 report. Thank you very much, and goodbye.
Thank you everybody. Bye bye.