Distinguished investors, good morning, and welcome to the 2021 interim results announcement of Sunny Optical Technology Group. I'm Daisy from Investor Relation. On behalf of our company, I would like to take this opportunity to thank you for your warm and support. Being influenced by the pandemic, this announcement will be conducted via online platform. Sorry for the inconvenience. First of all, please allow me to introduce our management presenting in today's event. They are Executive Director and Chairman of the company, Mr. Ye Liaoning. Executive Director and CEO, Mr. Sun Yang. Vice President and Joint Company Secretary, Mr. Ma Jianfeng. Also, in our Hong Kong venue, IR Director and Joint Company Secretary, Madam Wong Pui Ling. Associate IR Director, Madam Lui Yanfeng . We'll present to you our annual results in a presentation that has been uploaded to our official site. Please feel free to download.
Let's welcome Executive Director and Chairman, Mr. Sun Yang, to brief you the 2021 interim results. Let's welcome Mr. Sun.
Okay. Thank you to investors for your participation. Due to the pandemic, just like last year, we'll be conduct this event via online video conference. I'd like to brief you Sunny Optical Tech 2021, the first half operation situation. Let's take a look at our revenue. In the first half of the year, we have CNY 19.8 billion, and that is a 5.1% up. That is a not so easy increase of the performance, and that is because in different terminals of our handsets has been increase in the market share and also for intelligent driving EVs. All these industry, their demands towards the sensors has been expanding.
Yes, in between we have some fluctuations in terms of the chips, but these are two of the main driving forces, and we still create a 5.1% of revenue increase. Let's take a look at gross profit. We have 34.5% of growth in first half of the year. We have got CNY 4.9 billion in this part. As you can see, the gross profit growing speed is a lot faster than our revenue. That is because our handset unit, BU, and the camera unit, BU, in the first half of the year, they have been improving their manufacturing technology, manufacturing process, and they further increase the establishment or the construction of the supply chain. That has been pulling our group's gross profit into a higher standard.
For the third part, we can see the profit before tax, that is $3.2 billion, and that is a 52.1% of growth. Our effective tax rate it's kind of same comparing to the first half of 2020. For the profit for the peer attribute to owner of the company, that is 53.7%. Earning per share is 53.9% of growth. That is our basic situation in our revenue. Now let's look at our expenditures. In terms of the expenditures or the expenses, our operating expenses is kind of close to last year. That is 9.4%. Now, as you can see, selling and distribution expenses and administration expenses are maintaining approximately to the same level. However, if you look at the R&D expenditure, we have 1% of increase in that.
Here, except for the continuous investments in our lens and sets and so on, we have been investing more in our vehicle-boarded cameras and lidars, HUDs, smart headlights, and so on. We have more increase in investments in these parts. In second part also that in AR/VR, we have been investing more as well. In these new business, we are investing more, and that is the reason why we have 1% of increase in the R&D expenditure. We are investing for the future. Next, let's take a look at a few more index here. For current ratio, it's now 1.8. The operating cash flow is CNY 2.3 billion. That's pretty good. In terms of our cash, we have CNY 111 billion. Net per share now is CNY 5.34, and the gearing ratio have been further decreased down to 16.4%.
The ROE increased 1.6% and now reaches 14.6%. For our CapEx, it is now CNY 1 billion. It's kind of maintaining what we mentioned in the beginning of the year, so I'm not going to repeat it. Here in this slide, you probably look at this quite often. That is the final product of the company, their application in these few domains. The largest part is still highly related to our handset units. In first half of the year, it takes 80% of our revenue, and the YOY was 88%. What can be more happy about is they can see, in the lighter yellow, those are product related to vehicle, and it increased from 5% to 8%. That indicates the vehicle-related products now has become a second growing pillar of our group. This part is about the GP margins.
Let's take a look at the overall situation. In the first half of this year was 24.9%. It is a 5.4% growth YOY. If we take a look at the Optical Components, we have 1.4% growth, now reaches 24.9%. For our Optoelectronic Products, we have 3.7% growth, which hits 14.8%. In terms of our Optical Instruments, it's up by 5.6%, now hits 44.2%. We can say that in the first half of the year, these three main pillars are improving in terms of their GP margin. Due to the first half of last year, it's influenced by the pandemic, it's still influencing this. Overall speaking, in the second half of the year, smartphones, in terms of their downgrade of their parameters, we're not seeing a stamp of that trend.
Well, in the second half of this year, that probably will be the trend to beat. We do feel that pressure. Overall speaking, through our effort of the overall year in 2021, our overall GP margin through our own efforts, hopefully that we can have a better increase comparing to 2020. Long-term wise, next year or the year after that, next year, no matter it's about the smartphones or vehicle board cameras, lenses, and so on, the upgrade of these equipments, that is a certain trend. We do believe and we do hope that through our effort, we can increase the GP margin. That's all about the GP margin. Here in this slide, let's take a look at this one. These are some of our breakthroughs in R&D. Now let's take a look at the Optical Components. This is a BU.
Now this is smartphone-related R&D. The R&D completed in this domain, first, this is a turnable conventional lenses. It's kind of like a liquid lens. We call them T-lens. This is for front camera, fast focus technology, and we've completed our R&D in this part. What have we completed for the second one is we have a super wide or ultra wide angle lens. We've completed that R&D. Third is what everyone cares, is our hybrid GM+P large image size lens set, this is the application for main cameras. We've completed the R&D for this one as well. On the right-hand side, these are the technologies that's already in mass production phase. First of all is the 3 mm ultra macro shooting lens set. This can be adapted on our smartphones, and we can use this as a microscope.
This is a pretty niche market. Second one is that we've completed the 10x periscope telephoto lens set with pure plastic lenses, and this is now under mass production. We're the first one in the industry, and these are related to our smartphones. Second is related to vehicle. In this part, first of all, we have finished something based on NVIDIA platform that is a 8 MP autonomous drive lens set. In the future, the NVIDIA platform will become even more significant when the levels of self-driving vehicles increase. We'll have more cooperations with them. 8 MP is a project we finished this year, and also we've got other projects already went through NVIDIA's certification. Also we have the OMS or DMS 5MP hybrid in-cabin lens set. For this one, we've completed our R&D as well.
For the third part is our HUD. The HUD we've completed here is AR-HUD, it's based on VOP solution. The R&D for this one has been completed as well. On the right-hand side, already now in mass production phase, we've got three items for this one. It's all about lidar. We've got the transmitter and receiver modules. It's all under mass production. Also, the window outside the lidar itself is now under mass production as well. Also, we have got the polygonal prisms. We have already put this under mass production as well. For the final one, let's take a look at our AR technology. For our AR three-color waveguides, we've completed our R&D on that as well. Also, for the next one is our VR optical module. What's that about? That's that in virtual reality.
We have finished the R&D for the assembly, for the improvement distortion of the chromatic aberration. These are the R&D milestones we have achieved in the Optical Components BU. Next one is our Optoelectronic Products. First of all, we're talking about something related to smartphone. For the first one, we have this something quite like T-lens. It's a camera module with tunable cover lenses. This is a component that is being coupled with the lens. It's going to be replacing the traditional VCM. Next one is that we've already completed the 3x, 2x continuous zoom camera modules. The next one is that we'll be doing the dual OIS camera. For this sensor shift and lens shift, we'll be combining them together to do a dual OIS. That's the first one in the industry. That's the R&D.
On the right-hand side, the first one is the 10x optical zoom periscope camera modules. We all know this. Second, we are the leading one in the industry as well. That is our gimbal stabilization camera modules with ultra wide angle. We've completed this to enter this through mass production. Third one, it's a freeform camera modules, including ultra wide angle and low distortion.
Next part is related with the vehicles. On the left-hand side, you can see that we had carried out the in-depth visual ranging modules based on the OMS and the DUS. We have the RGB and the ToF combined solutions. We are able to view the 2D images and also the 3D images, so that the gesture identifications and lip movement identifications will be based on it. The second one, it seems to be not so obvious, but we have the low cost miniaturized exterior viewing modules. We hope that in the future, the scale can be more and more miniaturized and will not be visible if you embed it in the vehicles. We are also saving the cost. It is very challenging as we had finished this kind of R&Ds in the first half.
On the right-hand side, you can see what are the things that have entered into the mass productions. The first is that we are very proud to be the first supplier in the industry to be able to deliver the 8M front-view sensing modules. Also, we have the DMS modules and OMS modules enter into the mass productions. The last but not least part is the other applications. First, is that based on the ToF and structured light technologies, we have the facial recognition plus in vivo recognition technology, and it's mainly used in the facial scan payment. We had completed this R&D. On the right-hand side, you can see the items that has entered into the mass production. The first is the AR/VR, especially in the Oculus project.
We have a very large market share, and we have been making a lot of progress on that. Also, in the sweeping robots, we not only have the ToF hardwares, but also we have the radar wave processes combined with algorithms. We have put that into the SDKs to enable the easier development for the customers. In the future, we may expand further from SDK to chips. In terms of the Optical Instruments, I will very quickly go through it with you. On the left-hand side, the R&D completed items. The first is the prism appearance inspection equipment. The second, the vehicle lens inspection equipment. The third one is the achromatic objective project. We have an achromatic objective. On the right-hand side, you can see the production in a mass scale. The first is the wafer fragment inspection equipment.
The second is the real-time focusing microscopic system. The third is the upright near-infrared region two motorized fluorescence microscope in vivo imaging system, so that we can go further depths in viewing the in vivo samples. Next, it's also related with the R&D. Let's take a look at the patents we have. By the first half of this year, the granted patents had reached 2,488, increased by 392 compared with last year. Among which 185 are the patents of inventions. These are the granted patents by the first half of the year. Actually, we also have 3,612 patents in pending. We mainly focus on the sensing modules, AR/VR, robot vision, and some of the other fields. This is about our patents.
On this slide, let's talk about several main production lines, about their shipments and the future outlook. The first is the shipments volume of the handset lens sets. In the first half of this year, we have about CNY 717 million, increased by 11.1%. We made another statistic for lens sets over 6P, we have CNY 163 million. We believe that it is a very large quantity. In the second half of the year or throughout the whole year, we also have a guidance, and this is based on the actual result in the first half. The full year shipment for handset lens sets compared with 2020 will be increased by 5%-10%. This is the full year guidance for the shipment of handset lens sets. On this slide, let's take a look at the vehicle lens sets.
We have a very robust recovery in the first half because the baseline of last year, it was relatively low, and we had a growth by 82%, reaching 37,317. I'd like to provide you with a full year guidance of the shipment for vehicle lens sets. We believe that in 2021, compared with 2020, we will hit 30%-35% growth year-on-year. On this slide, this is about our camera modules. On the left-hand side, you can see the total values. In the first half, we have CNY 360 million, grew by 34.5%. On the right-hand side, we had been updating those figures. We believe that it will give us a better added value, such as the large image size or the periscopic ones. There was a drop of 21% year-on-year.
Throughout the whole year, the total guidance for the full year shipment was 20%-25% growth year-on-year. I'll skip this slide. You have visited our new production bases, and it is going very smoothly. In India and Vietnam, we are also having very steady progresses there. The last part is our outlook. Maybe I'm not reading the PPT for you. Just to share with you some of the highlights. The first is about the smartphone. We believe that upgrade is a definitive trend. Maybe it will happen next year or the year after next year, and we will focus on the large image size and also the hybrid materials, glass plus plastics, and also sensor shift. The fourth part is the continuous zooming. We have made a lot of R&D investment on all of these fields.
Once we have an up-spec trend, we will definitely take a very advantageous position. This is the first main information delivered to you. The second one may be much concerned by you, is the situation of the American company. We are very happy to tell you that American company is very happy with our offering, and the progress is beyond our expectations. This is about the smartphone products. On the next slide is about products related with the vehicles. I can preview the overall situation and some of the achievements we have been making. First, the 8 MP front-view ADAS vehicle modules. In the first half of the year, we had the first mass production solution in industry, and in the second half, we will have three mass production solutions, and also design win already have 10 different modules.
In China, we had covered almost all of the 8 MP front-view ADAS. The second part is the lidar optical system. In design win, we already have 10 lidar solutions. We had covered almost all of the top players. This is about the vehicle camera modules. The last slide is about our Smart Eye AIoT. We are very pleased to tell you that in the second half of the year, based on a 22 nm processing, we will have an SoC used on some of the AIoT production lines. We cannot offer you more details at the current moment. Definitely, we will have the 22 nm SoC. To have the actual Smart Eye completed. This is our coverage in Smart Eye, s martphones, and vehicle-related products as well as the SRT. Thank you for your patience.
Thank you very much, Mr. Sun, for your presentation. Now we will enter into the Q&A sessions. You can ask via voice or text. If you want to ask via voice, please press the raise hand button to wait in the queue. After you are unmuted, you can start the question. Also please inform us your organization and name before asking the questions. If you want to ask via text, please click Q&A and type in your question. Let's invite the first investor, Tina Wong. You have been unmuted. You can go ahead.
Thank you, management. Congratulations on a great performance. I have two questions. The first is related to the vehicle business because we sensed that the investors also pay a lot of attention to the vehicle and SaaS development, especially on the changes of the price.
We like to know about the factors influencing the price changes. Is it about different customers or different types of the products or and other reasons, for example, from the supply chains or from any other variables of the products, why we have a different ASP? This is my first question. The second question is also related with the vehicle business because in the outlook we have the 8 MP front view lens. We will have more and more shipments of that part of the product, and we also have some progresses in the mass productions of the lidar. Apart from the vehicle lens sets, what is our forecast for the future development? Another question is related with the handset lens sets.
I'd like to know more about the price in the first half of the year and what will be the outlook for the second half of the year. Thank you.
Let me answer your first question. We have the vehicle-related product sessions in this slide, and before we use the vehicle lens sets. Why we have such a change? In the presentation of Mr. Sun, he already had mentioned that because in the production lines, industrial lines of the vehicle businesses, it has become the second growth engines for Sunny Optical Technology. Also we have made all sufficient preparations for these pipelines, and maybe we will put together those products and then have a breakdown. This is a more reasonable practice.
We have the vehicle lens sets, we also have the vehicle modules, we also have HUD, Smart Eye, et cetera, and also have the lidars. About the infrared vehicle lens sets, we also have included that into the vehicle-related products. In the first half, the ASP is actually very stable, and the biggest pressure comes from the appreciation of RMB compared with the same period last year. If I had remembered the correct rate of foreign exchange rates, last year was about 7%, and in the first half of this year was about 6.4%-6.5%, and there was a growth of about 7%-8%. In terms of the US dollars, it's quite stable, and even there is a slight increase. This is about your first question. The second question is about the handset lens sets.
The ASP of the handset lens sets impacted by the epidemic. There was a de-SPAC situation in the industry, there was a drop of a single digit. Throughout the whole year, we hope that the second half ASP, compared with the first half of this year, it can be more stabilized, but still we are pressured.
Understood. Thank you.
Thank you, Tina, and thank you, our management. Next, let's welcome Andy Meng. You have been unmuted. Please go ahead.
Thank you, moderator. Thank you, management. I also have two questions. The first is that we have noticed that in July, the shipment of the vehicle lens sets had a slight drop, it is because of the chip variations in the downstream. Can you give us a quantified situation introduction of the vehicle lens sets? What will be the normal shipment of the vehicle lens sets?
In the future, what is the growth logic? Is there any changes of that? The second question is about the handset lens sets. We had a notice that in the handset lens sets and the modules, there is increased percentage of the products provided to our own group. Does that affect our GP margins for the Optoelectronic Products? Will it also have an effect on the GP margins of the Optical Components? Thank you.
For your first question, in terms of the vehicle lens sets. In terms of the shipment for the guidance, actually, I mentioned that. In terms of the annual view, it's around 30%-35% growth.
Yes, we're seeing in the industry the lacking of chips. We are seeing that as well. We do think that the shipments will increase because sensors boarded on vehicles, the amount of that is increasing. No matter it's the visual sensors or lidar sensors, they're all using that. For the coming years, it is a high percentage, a high possibility that the shipping amount will be increased. In terms of our guidance that we offer this year, this is a result after we made communications with our customers, clients. Overall speaking, we do have an estimation of that between 30%-35%, because in terms of vehicle lens sets, we are number one in the world, and we do have quite a lot of space over here. We're looking at speeding up and the penetration rate is increasing. That's the answer for your first question.
As for your second question, in terms of the handset lens sets and lenses, your self-supply, actually, you are putting more focus than I do. We are not calculating the self-supply right now b ecause two of the BUs are all based on the market mechanism. They're operating on that. For self-supply, if it increase in that, do we have a improvement in GP margin? Well, actually, it's not related. It's all based on the demand of the customers to make the best modules and components for them. That's the situation.
All right. Thank you, Mr. Sun.
Thank you, Andy. Thank you, management. Next, let's welcome the next question. Lu Ping. Lu Ping, you are unmuted. Please go ahead.
Okay. I've got two questions here. First one is about the handset. We're seeing the first half business in the handset unit, your revenue is decreasing. That's the first time I'm seeing this for many years, I think it is actually shifting down. I would like to know your view, Mr. Sun, Mr. Ma, for the future growth of your smartphone business over here, because we're seeing the amount of your handset business is pretty stable, and also for the downgrade trend, its trend is pretty stable as well. What do you think about the future of this business domain? Is it going to be stable as well? That's the first question.
For the second question, just like Mr. Sun mentioned, AI technology, how do you view it? You mentioned the market share is leading in this domain because your AI product. Is it still relatively early in terms of the competing landscape? We're still waiting for probably in the market, there will be other competitors releasing new products. How do we view ourself? What is our competitiveness and advantage in that part?
Well, I mentioned it just a bit, so I would like to clear it out. First of all, in terms of the handset lens sets, in terms of the HOS, no matter the market share of our company or revenue of our company, we do all think that there are rooms of improvement. We will not just stop here. Not stop at the number of the figures you mentioned. It's pretty simple, because in terms of market share, a company from the U.S., their market share is increasing. For [Huawei and Leo], their market share is increasing. Second is that this year, because of the downgrade trend, the price is not optimum.
In terms of our T-lens, continuous zoom switches and so on, the price is going to increase. If that increase, the amount will increase as well. The revenue will increase. That's the answer for that. Second, in terms of AR/VR, let me just pull them together. What we are leading is in the VR product, including VR cameras, lenses. Because the main player is Oculus, and we're taking a big portion of that. Here, just like you mentioned, this is in the early stage. The industry is in its early stage. In this early stage, we've already gained the top player. Within the top players, we are taking its main share in its optical system. That's the reason why I'm putting the words like this. We are leading in VR. Well, we are leading in AR as well.
We can put it that way. In China, there are only few players like us that can achieve the technology we have right now. For the first half of the year, we already finished all those technologies' R&D, and some of them are even under mass production. That will be my answer.
Okay. Thank you.
Thank you, Lu Ping. Thank you, management. Next, let's take the next question. Tony Zhang. Tony Zhang, you are unmuted. Please go ahead.
Thank you, management. I've got two questions. For the handset lens set, we're seeing some price pressure in the first half of the year. In terms of the optical unit, our GP margins, we'll be increasing as well. Can you explain why can we achieve that? Also, for 3D ToF and SDK, we're trying to make chips.
What's your thoughts and your positioning on the chip manufacturing? In terms of equipment, in semiconductor, we do have a replacement for overseas equipment for the semiconductors, right? I would like to know what's the function of those equipments.
First of all, in terms of the HLS, the optical component GP margin increase, the reason of that is pretty simple. That is in the first half of the year, internally, we are making some management and administration improvements. That's the core reason why our GP margin can have an increase in year-over-year comparison. Second, in terms of the SoC, I would like to make explanation. The thought behind that is pretty simple, because in AIoT, it's a shattered market. The client is in its different levels.
If we just give them ToF, a hardware like that, in terms of the ISV, and other merging of the information and so on, it's actually quite complicated. The thoughts behind those is that we are going to make an R&D of the SoC, and there will be an ARM structure. We have got boosters as well, and also we have got cores for 3D processing. It is the first time that we're doing this with our collaborators, because our collaborator, they've already got their experience in SoC, and they've got a lot of them patterned. We're not just started on our own in fresh hands. We do have alliance with that, and also we've done the market research, done the study and comparison. Hardware plus chip plus algorithm, this solution to the lending of specific IoTs will be pretty helpful.
Currently, in terms of our market research, that's what we receive. Can we really make this a blockbuster hit in the market or be welcome by our clients? That probably need to be reviewed by time. Hardware plus chip plus algorithm to form the Smart Eye will be the direction of Sunny Optical Tech. All right?
Okay. Thank you.
Thank you, Tony. Thank you, management. Let's take the next question. Tommy Tang, you are now unmuted. Please go ahead.
Mr. Ye, Mr. Ma, Mr. Sun, hello, everyone. Hello, management. Two questions. First one is, if we see the revenue and profit, in terms of a quarter, do we have any change in that? Second is related to handset unit. We've got two questions here. One is that we have pretty high margin in the modules. Do you think that this will become the new norm? Second is that in your U.S. client, what's your estimation of your profitability comparing to the HLS?
For the first question, in terms of the time for the profit, the major influence of that is because of the pandemic instead of the high-low season. Second, in terms of the camera module GP margin, in the past few years, through our internal efforts, we are increasing our own GP margin. Speaking from this year, we are doing pretty good in the first half, but for the second half of the year, because of the downgrade trend, we do reckon that we're under pressure. In terms of our annual goal, we do want to outperform our last year's performance. After the new technology is introduced, based on our optimization for our management system, hopefully we can reach a better GP margin in that as well.
Basically speaking, we need to follow the market trend, by doing so, we need to improve our internal management. Yes, that is pretty pressurized as well. In terms of the GP margin of our North American client, in terms of that, don't just look at that. Don't just look at single client. Look at the overall situation of our HLS. During our cooperation with our clients, what we need to care is, do we win positive comments from our clients? That's pretty significant, currently speaking. By offering a good product structure, we do believe that we can have better GP margin performance. Now, thank you.
Let's take the next question from Fu Tianzi. You're now unmuted. Please go ahead.
All right. Hello, management. In terms of your lidar, your AR, VR, and vehicle boarded components, you've got R&D performing pretty good and some of that under mass production. We do think that the market is pretty interested to see all of this, and also it provides a good growth to the company. In terms of the upgrade of the handset, I would like to continue your question. In terms of the downtrend, that's influencing the first half and second half of our ASP. At the same time, it also indicates that next year there's a hope for the huge increase for the GPM rate. Why is that this year we're seeing a downgrade, and next year we're probably seeing an upgrade of these smartphones? Why is that? What's the logic behind that?
Also for Mr. Sun, in terms of the handset lens sets and the ASP in second half of this year, what will be the trend of that?
First of all, the judgment behind that is, what I mentioned is actually next or the year after next, we are seeing that trend. It's actually pretty easy to understand. When we are making exchanges with the R&D department of our clients, NplusP, double OIS, continuous focusing or zoom changing, they have different focus in our different clients, but people are making their own judgments, right? What I'd like to say is these judgments, these new parameters, new products, will definitely be used in their new products, new cell phones. Is it going to be next year? Is it going to be the year after next one? That depends on them.
After making exchange with the R&D department, we do feel that trend. Well, for the first half of year, we're doing like this. For the next second half of year, can we increase the efficiency? Can we improve the cost and so on? All these sayings are from our clients. Some of these words are from the R&D. Some of their words are from procurement or market department. I think this is actually quite easy to understand. If the upgrade is significant, the increase of GP margin is just a result of that, a pretty natural result of that. What's your other question?
About ASP and the GP margin in the second half of the year and outlook towards the next year.
Actually, Mr. Sun had emphasized on the GP margin already. Already we have a backdrop of the de-SPAC. We had been pressured. Our goal for the whole year compared with 2020, we hope that with our efforts, it can be stabilized and improved. About ASP of the handset lens sets and the camera modules. Actually, we already answered the question for handset lens sets. We had been pressured, but we hope to stabilize it compared with the first half. For the modules, there is some special situations. The first is the performance of ASP. Compared with same period last year, there was a drop. It was a very obvious two-digit drop. I remembered that in March this year, we already provided you a guideline. Our goal of ASP, compared with the second half of this year, we want to stabilize it.
We already had realized that goal. The biggest difference is, let me repeat, our biggest customer started from Q4 last year. There was a big drop of the market share, and that has a big impact on our camera module, and the product structure of that biggest customer is also the optimal. For us, Q3 and Q4 last year, there was a big change of the ASP. What we had been benchmarking is that the second half of last year ASP. Compared with Q4 last year, there was improvement. The customer structure of last year and this year, there is a big change as well. In the first half of this year, we had very successfully digested those kinds of negative impact. Our goal is to maintain a stabilized situation of the first half of the year.
We will also improve the performance compared with Q4 last year. This is the current expectations. As for the longer term expectations, you can go back to what Mr. Sun has been answered. The better products will bring about the more satisfying ASP.
Thank you, Tianzi, and thank you, management. Liang, Mr. Liang, you are unmuted. Please go ahead.
Thank you, management. I have two small questions. The first is about the GP margin of the handset modules. In the first half of the year, there was a good growth. You also mentioned the changes of the customer structures, and there is increased proportion of our Korean customers. Can we understand in that way? In the future, once there is a bigger proportion of the module businesses, will that contribute to a better margin compared with the domestic modules?
About the ASP structure of modules and GPM, right? All right. This year, we are very clear about the issues of the GP margins this year. This is mainly related with the whole market and with the adjustment of our customer structures. As time goes by, we had been increasing the shares of the new customers, also we will update the specifications of the modules in the future. With these two factors, I believe that the ASP will be improved for sure, also it will help the improvement of the GP margin. The manufacturing systems with our efforts over the past few years will also be great. We have a great production process and automated processes and a better yield. All of these has been improved. Putting these factors together, we are very confident to improve the GP margin. Thank you.
Thank you, management. My second question is about the vehicle camera modules. We mentioned that the 8 MP front view modules already have won the biddings of some projects. For that project, based on the existing vehicle modules, we will further upgrade the offerings. What is our advantages in the 8 MP modules, and what is our positionings in the tier one?
We can take a look at this issue from two perspectives. The first is the increase the penetration rates of ADAS. This is a big pull for us. It means we had been facing a quick surge of the demand. Previously, we had been developing the vehicle modules. There are some emerging players, and those emerging need have a very clear requirement, and we do have the capabilities that can flexibly and agilely meet their needs. This is a huge market potential for us. With the increasement of the penetration rate, we still see the further release of the capacities of existing suppliers.
As for us, we do have the big background and expertise in this industry, and the customers are very willing to collaborate with us. That's why I say we had been facing very promising market opportunities. We do have seen a bigger demand from the market. We have a lot of customers. Some come from the tier ones, some are the emerging new players. They will gradually become our customers.
Thank you, management.
Thank you, Mr. Liang. Thank you, management for the answers. Next, let's welcome Jacob Lee. You have been unmuted. Please go ahead. Jacob? Maybe the connection is poor. Let's switch to the next investor, Cherry Ma. Cherry, you have been unmuted. Please go ahead.
Hello, management. I have several questions to ask. The first, the R&D completion slide, you mentioned about the VR optical module, and there is a big customer in America. Are you making these R&Ds in preparation for that customer? In the display assembly and the existing OD, what are the differences, and why do we need to make such a combination? This is my first question.
Okay. This is a very professional question. The first question, can you repeat that? Sorry.
Okay. You mentioned that we have been developing the VR optical modules.
Okay. Yes. In VR, we have been making some new R&D in preparation for the next generation products. Yes, you're right. The second question, from the professional's perspective, we can use the Fresnel lens or the aspherical lens, plus some of the IG solution. This is very complicated for the automatic alignment. We have to have very deep understandings of the optical systems, and all of these are based on our expertise in optical industries.
For our customers, they also believe that a screen plus the lens will be regarded as a big module, we can deliver it to the other OEM. For the whole VR systems, we will improve the yields and reliability. This is a very natural selection for us, and this is also based on our own expertise in optical industries. We had gained this custom and business with our own expertise.
Okay. The second question is that we will have AR/VR chipsets. For these chipsets, is it a platform-based one or is it customized for certain products?
Well, because we are the first company who can develop such chip, so theoretically, in a very special, specific area with a large quantity, then we will focus on the ASIC in terms of efficiency and economic considerations.
Maybe the customers will also add together some of their own algorithms. The first product we have is an SoC platform. In the future, once we have a very special application scenario with a large quantity, then we can develop ASIC with certain customized functions. We believe that our current strategy is very appropriate because if we directly go to the ASIC, maybe we want to have a deep understanding of certain application scenarios.
Okay. My third question is about OpEx, Mr. Ma. And before we mentioned that the goal was 8%-8.5%, and in the first half, we had go beyond that target. And what about second half of the year?
Okay. The answer is that we will increasingly invest in the OpEx and it will be maintained between 8%-9%.
Okay. Sorry, I have a lot of questions. The next one is the vehicle-related products. We have 8% and handset related products is 8%. Can you share with us the proportion of the lens sets?
Maybe you can have a calculation yourself. All right?
Okay. Thank you.
Thank you, Cherry, and thank you for the management. Due to the interest of time, we will invite the last investor to ask the question. Frank Hua, you have been unmuted. Please go ahead.
Thank you, management. I have a small question related with the waveguide product deployment. Can you share with us the difference of waveguide? Do we have some special patents or do we have something differentiated from our peers? Because for DOE, we may use some semiconductor processing solutions. I am not sure in the vertical integrations, to what extent had we developed? To what depths had we developed? Can you give us more information about that? Thank you.
In the AR optical waveguide, we have been going towards two directions. The first is to learn from the best players. We need to learn from the big players. The second is to have some special strength, such as the development of software of the optical waveguide. Together with the big players leading in industries, we had been developing that software.
Also, I'm not the expertise of this, but what I can tell you is that we need to do two things. The first is to learn from the advantageous players and to learn the lessons from their practices. The second is to set up our own knowhow and our own advantages, such as the development software I had mentioned to you. In a semiconductor optical industries, we have made a lot of investments. We didn't purchase EUV and DUV. As you know, in the whole process, it's very complicated. As for RVIE, we will continue to buy those equipments, and we do have a heavy investment on that. This is about the semiconductor processing.
I have a follow-up question. Next year, will we expect some revenues from the optical waveguides or is it uncertain?
The key is still for the R&D manufacturing process and the manufacturing capability of the template, and also for the semiconductor equipment to utilize everything, actually require a lot of time for the team already.
Understand. Thank you, Mr. Sun.
Thank you, Frank. Thank you, management. Due to limited time, we cannot answer all the questions from the investors. If you've got any questions, please do contact with the IR team. Thanks for your understanding. Ladies and gentlemen, this is the end of the Sunny Optical 2020 results announcement. Thank you. Thank you again for your participation. Interim results announcement.