Ladies and gentlemen, thank you very much for taking your precious time out of your busy schedule to attend Renesas Electronics 2023 Capital Market Day. We expect to begin in five minutes from now from 9:00 AM JST. Please make sure to complete your setting on Zoom by inputting your company name and your full name and stand by. After each presentation, we prepare a Q&A session. Those audiences participating online, we will be entertaining your question in voice using Raise Hand function of Zoom. The MC will ask if you have any questions and to raise your hand. If you have any questions, please press Raise Hand button on the screen. From the hands that we have seen in order, we will be calling out your company name and your full name.
If your name is called by the MC, you'll be able to make a statement. Please begin your question. Please be advised that today's session will be recorded for the purpose of record-taking and also for posting on the webpage later on. We'll begin shortly. Ladies and gentlemen, good morning. Thank you very much for taking your precious time out of your busy schedule to attend Renesas Electronics 2023 Capital Market Day. This is today's agenda. As you can see, we expect to finish the entire session in 3 hours and 20 minutes at about 12:20 PM. The materials to be used for today's presentation is already posted on the IR website of the company. We are expecting to post a video of this session later on the same webpage. We prepare a Q&A session after each presentation.
Those audiences participating online can raise their question in voice using Raise Hand button of Zoom. If your name is called by the MC, you are allowed to make your statement in voice, so please unmute yourself and then begin your question. We will take up to two questions per one questioner. Now, without further ado, I would like to invite Mr. CEO, Mr. Shibata, CEO, to begin the session and begin his presentation.
Good morning, everyone. I am CEO at Renesas. My name is Shibata. Thank you very much for taking your precious time out of your busy schedule to attend this event. From this year, what happened to this last year, we held this capital market event twice a year to provide you with an update also. This time around, we have decided to integrate into one annual event. This time around, sales and marketing were divided previously in two divisions, but this time around, we have integrated these two into one unit. Sales and market globally overseen by Chris Allexandre will be presented and for human resources because we have implemented many different measures in the HR space.
Julie Pope from Tokyo will also make a presentation. With these members, the familiar names like Sailesh and Vivek and myself and Shinkai-san from here in Tokyo and also from San Jose will be making the presentations to the audience. Now. Well, I think I'm going to start off. This is the most scattered, I think, topic that I'm going to cover. In the first part, I would like to talk about the updates so far. In the latter part, I will talk about the approaches, our philosophy towards the future. I'll try to be concise and compact and do my best there. Immediately after me, our CFO, Mr. Shinkai, will also make a state presentation. We'll take the questions for these sessions together.
Okay, let's look back our journey so far. The track record for last year is, I think, many of you, I'm sure are familiar, but if you recap once again, as Renesas, we were able to achieve record profit and record sales, record revenue. Also, over the last several years, we've been focusing on technical supplementation or complementations with these tuck-in investments in the area of AI and radar. We have also acquired some companies. Most recently, we are trying to strengthen connectivity areas. Those companies, Panthronics, that Renesas has the technology was also right on the horizon. Personally, what impressed me, if you look at the bottom right, we received several recognitions from several entities or organizations. The Porter Prize of Hitotsubashi University. Previously, in my understanding, this was only given to very outstanding companies only.
With that, I really wasn't expecting that Renesas will be able to gain this prize. That was beyond our imagination. All the undertakings so far, I think have been recognized to some extent in terms of the numbers, in terms of recognition. Therefore, last year, I think was a very splendid year and fruitful year for us. That was a recap that I wanted to mention at this stage. From before, from occasion to occasion, I've been talking about the MCU. We received many questions regarding the MCU market share of Renesas from, at different occasions. Of course, in our business, the undertakings done today needs a little time lag for it to materialize. We've been talking about this market share will improve eventually. As far as MCU is concerned, that we have been able to achieve a 100 basis points improvement in 2022 compared to the previous year.
Regardless of the segment, when you look at the overall MCU market share, we are the number one position in the market right now. Over the last several years, over the last few years, we've been focusing on the 64-bit MPU embedded compute. In this area as well, we have been able to expand our market share to some extent in 2022. Again, we are the latecomer here, so we are still in the number one, number four position in this space. Over the last, in the next several years, we would like to increase our market share and the position going forward. That is the ambition that we have, and we will have that ambition as we undertake the day-to-day operations going forward.
Embedded compute is the core of our business, because we are semiconductor solution supplier. We're placing that as a core, Sailesh will explain, give more color to that. Around the embedded compute, we have the Winning Combos and other solutions. Through those solutions, analog mixed signals and some, to some, to some extent, power will be attached. By doing so, we would like to drive growth of our business. That's how we plan to re-leverage those attached capabilities. Now, the next page. This is the purpose of the company. The same slide again, repeated again here. I don't want to drag on this. In any event, all of us, including the employees and the end users included, and also the most important is our customers.
We have to make our lives easier for all these people. How are we going to achieve that? Which is listed up here. That's what we call a strategic agenda. If you look at the bottom half circle there, those are the items that we have to address one by one. We have to align the vectors together towards the purpose and take actions. By doing so, at the end of the day, we would like to make our customers' life easier, and I think that will also make the end users' life easier eventually. Our employees will have a more pleasant days as they work here. This is a strategic agenda. This remains unchanged from what we have presented to you to before. Again, diversification.
There's no so much update, so I would like to talk about these other 6 elements here and share with you the progress in all these other 6 elements. First, the focus for growth. For a design-in progress for automotive and also for IIoT, for both segments, we were able to achieve a 20%-23% increase in design-in value. As you can see from the slide here, last year we thought that was a stretch target to some extent, but we were able to overachieve the set target. In terms of design-in, it was a very fruitful year in 2022. For automotive, 20%, IIoT, 22% is the target for this year.
Of course, it's not only about the absolute amount, but the content of them is becoming increasingly important as a theme for us to address. As we have been talking from before, if this is composed of a limited number of huge size DN, the volatility will be significant, so we would like to have a well-balanced portfolio. I think the details about this will be explained later in Chris's section, I think. Then solution focus. As we've been talking to you, Winning Combos has been making a steadfast and good progress so far.
From last year, as you can see on the left-hand side, well, of course the count is very important, but of course, it's also very important to increase the quality so that we can provide a full system solution that are ready to use on the part of customers. That's the reason why we are working to improve the quality which is represented on the left-hand side. On the right-hand side, the Winning Combos proportion to our total DN has been tracked. By doing so, our solution focused, how this is evaluated by the customers will be visible. That's the reason why we have set this metrics here.
In this area as well, as you can see here, in last year, one third of total design-in came in from DN, so I think we can fairly say that we have made good progress here as well. This year, this is again, another stretch target, but we believe we will aim to achieve half of our value through DN going forward. Our Winning Combos, this is stretch, we're not really sure if we're able to achieve that, but we hope to make a good update to you when we meet you again this next year in this forum. The next one is a strategic focus of UX enhancements. I would like to Of course, Chris will cover the details later in his presentation, but in this area, to be honest with you, we at Renesas, I think, we are still at the catch-up phase versus our peers.
The competitors, I think this is something already taken for granted, but we are now making all-out efforts to try to catch up with them. That's the candid opinion that I have regarding our state. My view regarding Renesas, one of the common theme that I have is that there are good elements like technology IP or the dedicated workforce. All these, each element, individual element, is very high in terms of quality, but when they are integrated, when to make things easier to use for customers, in that regard, I think even before I came to Renesas, these were the things that were pointed out, that we have plenty of room for improvement, so from the external community.
Customer experience and the initiatives that can contribute to enhancing customer experience, if you work on this, them more, I think the individual strength that we had from before, can, I think, flourish going forward. As an enabler, user experience enhancement, is a very important thing that we have to tackle going forward. Next highlight, let me talk about the factories. This is a very small update. The new news is, in the middle here, as you can see, at Kofu, 16 factory, 16 line, we have this capability in Kofu. From 2025, we would like to launch an SiC line from 2025. This is a very small thing, but I think this is a new update that we can give to you today.
In addition, yesterday's press coverage and also in many different news, you may have seen that how we're going to expand our production going forward is a very major theme for us as well. In Japan and also overseas, and our standalone efforts and also p artnership with foundries and other customers. We are still making studies and exploring the avenue. We would like to give more meticulous consideration to this and at the right timing, we hope to make an update to you. If I dare try to comment on one thing which might be meaning for you, for to you, is, although we say that we are fab-lite, power and also for some node products, lagging nodes, we are committed to making continuous investments, and this will be covered by Shinkai-san later.
To some extent, CapEx and depreciation, we might have to expect a more stepped up initiative in those areas, and that's one thing that I would like to share with you at this juncture. IGBT, as we have already announced, the K6 plant in Kofu, that's one thing. The other thing that we have shared with you is the SiC new initiative that we have during these the timelines here. For IGBT, actually we are making good progress already and the number of employees. Actually, in the vicinity of Kofu, there are not so many competitors in the semiconductor space, and therefore, we have been able to achieve a favorable progress of hirings after soliciting their applications. I think, it with as things go as planned, I think we shall be able to launch the line as planned, according to the schedule.
As mentioned earlier, in a small sparks from 2025, we will make a second round of investment decision sometime this year so that we can launch the capacity and ramp up the capacity from 2025 onwards for SiC as well. Sorry for the scattered presentation. I would like to now talk about culture and also ESG to give you some updates. Culture. TAGIE is something that we have been eagerly promoting since over the last several years. Transparent, agile, global, innovative and entrepreneurial. Those are the five keywords here. As we mentioned to you last year, this year again, we conducted an employee survey, just finished it right recently. The score and the response was slightly higher than last year. 92% of the employees responded to the survey.
Last year the score was 91%, and we received about 5,000 comments. At the same time, we did find that there were a lot of positive comments in terms of transparency and entrepreneurial. This is exactly what we want to really focus on. In other words, even before we start to make the final decision, it is going to be important that we communicate to the members inside as well as outside the company in what we're trying to do. Some of the things that we'll be discussing today is something that we have not really yet made this full-fledged decision yet, but we still do want to make sure we'd be able to share with you this information because we want to be transparent.
As for agile, global, innovative, I'm sure that a lot of employees would still feel that there's a lot of things that we still need to work on. With that all that said, almost 70% of people, I do believe would agree that we still are doing better than last year. I think that is how they assess the current progress. In other words, everyone is feeling that we are moving forward. Also towards the right, it's really about this engagement. In other words, we want to grasp TAGIE in a more wider perspective in thinking what more we'd be able to do. For example, wellbeing or collaboration. There could be more areas for improvement, and especially within these, when it comes to like global or employee experience.
This is something that we're going to be focusing on, especially this year. I hope that Julie Pope will be able to share with you a little more detail on these areas. I hope you'd be able to look forward to what you'd be able to hear from Julie. Now this is about ESG. Last year, I think, there were some areas that we were saying that, yes, we are aware, but we still haven't been able to make some new works on. This year it's a bit different. In other words, all the areas that we are aware of, we have already been able to start some progress.
For example, you see some column that is in progress, also in darker blue, there are areas that we do find good progress so far. Of course, there are more that we still do have to do, but we do believe we are making very good progress so far. For example, these highlights for this year are the areas, the four areas that we put a check mark on. For example, supplier engagement and some of the regular supplier audit that we've been doing. This is something that, yes, from CDP, we're getting good recognition. Also for conflict mineral, we're just looking at 3TGs, now we have also been able to expand where we'd be looking at including mica. Not just cobalt, but also into mica.
Also for index, now we're able to obtain MSCI AA rating. Finally, at the end of April this year, we have been able to finally issue our sustainability report. All these activities, I think, I do believe the investors are feeling more comfortable with what Renesas is doing, even in terms of ESG. I do expect that the investors would be able to see what we're doing and say, "Yes, this is a company worth investing." All of those activities, yes, it's being reflected into our numbers. Some of the targets that we've mentioned before, it's all been achieved. Sometimes we do receive questions, aren't you going to update those numbers?
I still do want to think a little more before we'd be able to fully update the target. We still do have to expect high material cost in our foundries and also, when we have the power side really go up. The overall three is really good. The sell-through is good, but then when it comes to gross margin, it's not exactly an area where we'd be able to expect such a high, higher margin. When it comes to gross margin, especially, we still do expect it's going to be a bit challenging.
As we look into how the portfolio would go and how the cost would go, also, some of the investment required for our production sites and, some of the depreciation burden is something that we'd like to look at comprehensively before we'd be ready to really update the numbers. Please bear with us. The numbers at the moment we are still going to keep. From here on, we want to look a little more into the days ahead. I know, my schedule is tight. I do have to make sure that I be more compact, but the message here is really simple and one. In other words, I think this is something that I did mention in our previous earnings results, but we do want to expand our inventory.
If you'd be able to look at embedded computing, we want to make sure that we will be able to see an increased analog and power, slight increase. By doing that, as you can see on the right-hand side, the lead time perhaps could be reduced largely by like 30%-40% from the customer's perspective. There's a lot of less visibility, uncertainties, but we still do want to make sure we'd be able to show some results, and especially when it comes to inventory, this is an area where a lot of investors would be asking.
Based on what we were experiencing back in 2020, a lot of people were asking, "Are you okay with the inventory?" We have been controlling the inventory very, very tightly. At the same time, when we look into the future, we want to keep a balance between a tight discipline as well as how much we'd be able to have for our future growth. We want to make sure we'd be able to have good room so that we'd be able to secure large growth. Inventory control plus shortening the lead time, this is what we want to balance out so that we'd really be able to focus on what growth we'd be able to achieve.
As for target model DOI, it's going to be 20%, increased by 20% from the previous 100 to now 120 days. Some of the financial details, that's something that you'll be able to hear more from Shinkai-s an later on. Here we're looking into 2030 aspiration. No change to what I've mentioned earlier, before. Here we're looking at 2 times 3 is 6 times. The double time, times 2 is exactly what you'd be hearing from Vivek and Sailesh. We're going to be now renaming it the solutions group, but it's really about what product line growth we'd be able to achieve. That's where we'd be able to achieve that times 2. When it comes to time 3, that's about valuation and multiple expansion.
If we multiply that 2 for our numbers, that gives you 6 times. Especially when it comes to valuation gap, filling in the valuation gap, we've always been talking how Renesas has been doing better ever since 2019, this is really supported by a good tailwind. What are you going to do when there's a headwind? That's exactly why we want to keep a mantra, forge ahead profitability and emerge stronger. In other words, it's going to be important that we do control our expense. As we do that, we should be able to at least maintain a good margin, even if the top line starts to go down.
Now, our expectation at the moment, so when we come back to a growth phase of the market after the correction phase, we'd be able to have good assessment that we have been able to really emerge strongly after the downside. We do believe that's going to help in filling the valuation and some of the initiatives for that is something that have been questioned by some investors, but it's about capital allocation. I have been expressing before, but when it comes to dividend, we want to make sure we'd be able to restart offering our dividend payout as soon as possible. We should be able to announce this in the near future. That is our expectation.
When it comes to buybacks, just very recently, we have announced JPY 50 billion in amount of buyback. Some analysts and investors are now also saying that maybe you might want to start saying, declaring how much of free cash flow could be offered for dividend. We do believe we need a little more time before we'd be ready to say that, because there are some areas where we still do need to fill in other words, in terms of our capability. A little more M&A, not large, but we do believe there is a little more M&A that we have to do.
When that opportunity comes, it's something that we will not be able to say at this moment, when we know the opportunity presents itself, we want to be ready to go for it. Of course, if we're going to start paying out the dividend, we want to make sure we continuously pay out. If there's a good opportunity, we also do want to go for some buybacks. We're going to small start with the dividend. Once we become more stable, then we should be able to start talking about what kind of, for example, target within a free cash flow, etc. Aspiration, it's really the same thing that I have been saying.
I think these are all what ties in all together, but that's really the background in really going into the Sales and Marketing where you'll be able to hear more from Chris later on. The point here, in the past, IIBU and ABU, we had these BUs each separately pursuing growth. We do believe we have been able to see some results from that, from here on, we'd like to make sure that we do leverage the full capacity, capability of the entire Renesas, and that's what we're saying. For example, Sales and Marketing integration. For example, auto probably would be easy to understand, as automobile is going to be like a computer on four wheels.
Automotive or industry, infrastructure, IoT, that type of business unit categorization might become not exactly a hindrance, but it's having these two segments obviously is not going to become a driver, accelerator of our growth. That is why we decided to, well, first of all, change name. We want to come up with a naming centering on technology. It's a bit long, but this is how we want to call what we're going to do. For investors, I'm sure we'd be able to still speak with the language of business unit because that's probably going to come across better, especially as investors would like to compare ourselves with peers.
When we talk with internal members, we want to make sure that we be able to show our stance, our attitude, that we want to leverage the full perspective, full capability of what we're doing. That is why internally especially, we're going to be calling what we do on the way that we have on this slide. Especially when we want to, for example, with design in, we want to make sure that we'd be able to do some crossover activity 2.5 times more and also Winning Combos 60%. With that attitude, and so we do have this KPI, so we'd be able to facilitate or accelerate our intention to go in all one Renesas type of approach. Now, digitalization.
This is a connect, a Quick Connect Studio example that I have presented here, and I'm sure there's a lot of other things available. It's already available for you to see in our website. I hope you'll be able to look at. UX enhancement digitalization. In the end, it's really going to be to make our customer's life easier through digitalization. Especially when it comes to Quick Connect, it really goes into, ties into our future business. The device that comes on here may not always be Renesas products. So we want to make sure that we look at this from the customer's perspective.
From the customer's perspective, they'd be able to find on this Quick Connect Studio, be it Renesas product or non-Renesas product, and they still be able to enjoy simple programming, and they'd be able to order this board. Once they have it in their hand, the customers would already have a lot of things prepared. That's exactly what we're trying to offer. Of course, from here, it's really about expanding what we'd be able to put on this board. Again, digitalization, we want to make sure we'd be able to enhance our customer experience. When we try to do that, we don't want to just stick to just Renesas product that would come on board. I know I've been speaking a bit longer than initially expected.
I know I've been talking about a lot of things. Maybe it wasn't exactly easy for you to follow. Again, what this correction, this softening, what we're finding here in the market, we want to make sure we still be able to keep a good discipline within ourselves, so that we'd be able to get stronger. Hopefully, that is going to help filling in some of the valuation gap. Of course, as we look into the future, like I mentioned in today's presentation, we want to make sure that we'd be able to unite all the capabilities that we have in Renesas. So all the individual initiatives, we want to make sure we'd be able to integrate so that we'd be able to go as one whole Renesas.
In the end, as we have at this very bottom, we want to make sure what we do will make our lives easier. That would materialize our aspiration into 2030. I know I've been speaking for long, I'd like to ask Mr. Shinkai to seek his part. After that, we'd like to open the floor for Q&A. Shinkai-san, please.
Thank you very much. We'd like to invite Shuhei Shinkai, Senior Vice President and CFO. Thank you very much. I am Shuhei Shinkai, CFO. In this segment, I would like to talk about how we are moving ahead to achieve our aspiration towards a six-fold increase in our market cap. I will cover recent priorities, initiatives taken, and capital allocation approach. Let's break down the six-fold increase. We have on horizontal axis, the scale, which is expressed as twofold and triple on the vertical axis to represent valuation growth. Back in 2022, the actual is $12 billion. In 2030, the aspiration is to top $20 billion, which means an average annual growth rate of 7%-8% will be achieved from this point onwards. The main measures taken is execution of the midterm plan. We need to expand on production capacity.
We need to pursue inventory management. We need to acquire complementing technology through M&A. Let's look at the valuation on the vertical axis. This can be broken down into two steps. The first step is to close the valuation gap, eliminate the discount applied, and the second step is to grow the multiples even further. We need to first focus on the first step. Conduct down cycle management, achieve shareholder returns, and increase fall through to free cash flow. I would like to dwell on these points today. Moving on to the next slide. Please look at the shaded area at the center of the slide. They are just the results for the full fiscal year 2022 after adjustment. Register JPY 1,228.2 billion in sales, 36% in gross margin, and 35% in operating margin.
Just as a reminder, the adjusted results reflect exchange rates adjusted to midterm rates, JPY 100 to the US dollar and JPY 120 to the euro as applied to continuing operations. Compared to the midterm model on the right, both indicators, sales growth and also margins, have also made good progress to date. Even in an economic downturn, we plan to operate within the scope as indicated in this model. Moving on to the next page. Related to down cycle operational management, we need to take a look at changes in operational resilience. Up until this point in time, in terms of gross margin, operating margin, we have been able to maintain certain levels. What has changed compared to the past? Please pay attention to the right-hand side of the slide.
In terms of fixed costs between 2019 and 2022, we have been able to contain the increase in fixed cost to about 20%, even while sales doubled between this period. Amortization costs were controlled, MA synergies were materialized, SG&A savings continue to contribute to the performance. Hence, the overriding operating leverage has been contained, has become smaller. In terms of production mix, let's look at the front end. 2019 at this point in time, in-house production accounted for over 60%. By 2022, this has been controlled to around 40%. Changes in operating rates now have a smaller impact on gross margin. Let's look at the product mix. There's an increase in analog, The margin cushion is now larger. These changes have increased financial resilience. Let's move on to the next page.
Let's touch on the situation this year. As you see on this slide, first half of 2022 to the first half of 2023, we were looking at the gross margin bridge. Comparing the two on a year-over-year basis, gross margin is expected to decrease 3 percentage points. We have broken this down into some blocks. In terms of amortization expenses, there's a slight decrease year-over-year and registering positive for gross margin. On an automotive and industrial infrastructure IoT, sales year-over-year has declined. Therefore, company-wide mix has deteriorated due to lower sales volume year-over-year. Looking at utilization at the center, there has been some decline in terms of capacity utilization, 250 basis points. First half of last year and this first half of this year in comparison, utilization for 90% has declined to 70%.
That's about a 20 percentage point decline. As you saw in the earlier slide, when we look at the changes within the cost construction, currently utilization 10% change would have an impact of about 1 percentage point on the company-wide gross margin. Hence, where the utilization rate decreases 20 percentage point, this translates to approximately 2.5 percentage point deterioration in gross margin. Let's look at the manufacturing cost. It has been increased and also an improvement in product mix, which are almost equal. There is increase for material and electricity cost as well. At in-house plants, increased outsourcing costs to foundries. However, this has been offset by mix improvement and price increase, and that describes the situation from previous year into this year. Let's look at the outlook. What will be prospects ahead? Looks like the amortization costs at the very left.
As we roll out investment to expand production, we expect this will increase in stages. For automotive, there will be a pickup on back of demand recovery. So there'll be an upturn, and the same applies for utilization as well. When we look at the manufacturing cost mix, of course, this is dependent on external, of course, market situation on cost side and also mix side. We have been attempting to strike a balance. In the subsequent pages, we are going to look at the capacity and also M&A. Moving on. Here, we're looking at capacity. Our production strategy is based on a fabless or fab-lite model. 20 nanometers and beyond are outsourced to foundries. At the center, the 40 nanometers and below are manufactured in-house and also our foundries. Very down below, power discrete are manufactured solely in our in-house facility.
2030, we plan to top JPY 20 billion in sales. That's double the current level. Capacity expansion also needed to materialize both in foundries and also in-house as well. In composition with the fabless, fab-lite model and the material and also power discrete, we are currently considering investment in these areas. As for power discrete investment is intended for Kofu Factory and also Takasaki for SiC production expansion. Looking at the rate, we are looking at capacity expansion as assumption, and we're looking at investment 5% against sales. That's the current level of investment against sales. This will arise exactly at what point in time this will materialize, will be decided as we are currently studying the various scenarios, and we will update you. We have the capacity status on the bottom right-hand corner.
In 2024, MCU analog, in 2025, power discrete capacity will ramp up. The timing of the capacity ramp up, it will be synchronized with the start of amortization and also cash out. In other words, amortization will start to increase from the year 2024. Moving on. Here, we're looking at the inventory strategy. In order to pursue a strategic inventory, we need to round up the DI, DOI level. We will expand the die bank and shorten the order lead time. This will put into focus the die bank holdings, die banks of general purpose MCU and also MPU and analog and power products. We'll set the bar higher. As for those who are produced in-house, due to prospective ECM, the die bank will have work as a buffer for products manufactured.
The current DOI model of 100 days plus is where we currently are, this will now be increased and rounded up to 120 days. As a result, what will happen is described in the bottom right-hand corner. The lead time for orders for general purpose products will be reduced by 30-40% under plan, starting with those for which die bank expansion has been completed. In a phased manner, we will be materializing on shortening of lead time for orders, fulfillment. Switching gears, the review on the horizontal axis measure an important component of capital allocation is M&A. I'd like to reflect back on past M&A deals. There have been three major M&A transactions to date, Intersil, IDT, and also Dialog.
As you recognize, after acquisition, growth have been registered, especially, Intersil in 6 years have doubled. There's been a remarkable growth. In Dialog, we are seeing growth registered around 2%. Down below, we are looking at the cost synergy. Against the target, we are overshooting the target. This is attributed to the reduction cost, expenses, cost-cutting measures, and the 3 large M&A transactions have produced positive results. In retrospect, valuation at acquisition was not that high. I believe it's fair to say so. For these M&A initiatives, we remain as a major investment opportunity. Moving on. Here, we're looking at tuck-ins. We're looking back on the tuck-in in M&A, a fairly small size in terms of technology as well as platform. We have a drive to also conduct M&A and tuck-ins from minority investment combined.
There have been eight acquisitions thus far, totaling $400 million overall, as we see at the bottom of the slide. From industrial IIoT to automotive, we have acquired a wide range of available products. How are we going to capitalize on the technology on a company-wide basis? There will be an explanation offered by Vivek later on. How we're going to utilize the platform, and this will be explained by Chris Allexandre later on. Here on capital allocation, as I've mentioned thus far, we have invested in growth and also shareholder returns emphasis
Is where we will be moving towards. The policy of shifting the axis capital allocation to investment in growth and shareholder returns remains unchanged. We'll consider capital investment, especially in the area of mature process. Of course, we are studying various options. In terms of investor, we have the DOI model which will be updated. We will shorten lead times and also prepare for BCM. Financial health, the leverage target remains unchanged. As for M&A, this will remain an important strategic option. Shareholder returns. Assumption of dividends will be paid out on a stable basis in small amount to be achieved as soon as possible. A share buyback will be carried out flexibly. Model update. We have recently updated DOI model from the conventional 100 days to 120 days. Otherwise, remains unchanged.
However, as we have indicated, we understand that there's a need to revise the DOI model, particularly for capital expenditures. Updates will be made in due course. Lastly, and this is same as the initial page, we will color in the six fold area map sequentially. Today, I venture to explain A and B measures captured in A and B. In subsequent opportunities, we will update you on progress here and on other initiatives. Thank you very much for your kind attention.
Thank you very much for the presentation. Now, we would like to move on to the Q&A session. In this Q&A session, Shibata-san and Shinkai will answer your questions. If you have any questions, please indicate by the Raise Hand button on your screen. In the order of the hands that we see, we will call your company name and your full name. Once your name is called by the MC, your microphone can be utilized. Please unmute yourself and begin your question. In the interest of time, we would like to limit the number of questions to two questions per 1 person. We thank you very much for your cooperation. The BofA Securities, Hirakawa-san, the floor is yours. Please unmute yourself and begin your question. Thank you very much.
BofA Securities, my name is Hirakawa. I have a question to the president. What left the strongest impression to me was all Renesas. All Renesas, where do you think is the biggest center force of your company? Is it the purpose of the company or customer centricity, or is it the pay raises, the profit in line with the profit growth? What drives the unity of the company most strongly? Can you talk about that? That's my first question. My second question is about the valuation expansion. I think on this, after all, the Renesas profit has been increasing, but if the automotive profitability is much higher, I think you'll be able to enjoy greater reviews. Maybe this is something that you're going to address in your phase two, maybe, but can you share your thoughts about that? That's my second question. Can you answer these questions?
Thank you. Regarding the effective force also, there are many things that can come into play there. For example, the closest things, and I think the most important thing would be the interaction with customers. As I mentioned earlier in my presentation, for example, when it comes to automotive from customer, they may be asking that they will be willing to listen to proposal of non-automotive technology, for example. In our conventional categorization, those customers were not reviewed to be a automotive customers, but they are now coming into the space of automotive business. That's happening day in and day out. I think, in order to make customers' lives easier, we have to deliver and propose all that we have, including the assets of the acquired companies, in a way that is easy to understand for customers, easy to use by customers.
That will, I think, lead to great reviews, especially when it comes to the changes of applications and technology. In addition to that, we in the geography that's showing a faster rate of growth, like the customers in Vietnam, India and China, if you go to those markets, we have to break away from the conventional thinking, and because these initiatives are better appreciated by these markets. We have to consider these things and come up with idea this that will be better appreciated by customers. I think that would be the biggest driving force to drive unity. The second point is the market share of the automotive, which is very difficult for me to comment.
Because of the EV ramp-up, I think the power discrete will see a surge immediately over the short terms. I think we are lagging behind compared to other competitors to some extent. IGBT, we thought that this is going to start up from 2025 in our case. In the meantime, when you look at the automotive semiconductors, I think we will continue to face some challenges in this period. Thereafter, if you consider the growth thereafter, of course, automotive is a very exciting space and we have to step up our activities. Of course, that is our mission, but still, as we've been talking from before, we have to also achieve a good balance between the different segments in a favorable fashion.
We have to look at the entire company and achieve growth as the overall company in a smooth way. That is the primary ambition that we have at the moment. Did I answer your question? I'm sorry, in the outset I said that some SiC production line, Takasaki and Kofu are mixed together. To be precise, the 6-inch Takasaki line will be the startup phase that we are going to use. That's a clarification that I wanted to share with you. Thank you.
Thank you very much. Next from Daiwa Securities, Mr. Sugiura. Please unmute yourself. You can ask your question now.
Thank you very much for the presentation. This is Sugiura from Daiwa Securities. I have one question. Within the semiconductor industry, I think you have been able to obtain like excess income or profit. For the past two years, for example, the semiconductor price had always been going up, even though it should have been going down. Also nowadays, it's really going on a downtrend, but then if you look at the entire semiconductor industry, there's a lot of BCP inventory that is being required. I mean, there are still some customer that's looking for inventories. Within that perspective, maybe there were like extra revenue or income that you've been able to gain. There are some concerns around that. Do you think there's going to be a negative rebound?
Do you think there's such a risk? I mean, some people might be feeling that. You are looking at the business on yourself. Do you think there's a potential for that? For example, do you think there's a chance that you might find this negative rebound in that sense? If that's going to materialize in the end, in order for you to still achieve your target, how do you think you'd be able to control that? If there's any like, thoughts that you have at the moment, can you share that with us? Thank you very much.
When it comes to that, I'm not exactly sure if you'd be able to say it as excess or extra revenue or income. I'm not exactly sure if that's really the right way to express that. With that said, if we try to look at this from the entire semiconductor industry, I think, like historically speaking, it's more like more value that had been leaking out of the semiconductor space. I think that was something that we have been observing in the past. I think it's really the profit. I think we now are more positioned to be able to secure the profit that used to just leak out of the semiconductor space. That's the view that we have.
Now, with that said, on the short-term perspective, of course, there will be some ups and downs. When it comes to price and the revenue and profit, it's not like we're always going to keep on finding a steady growth in all these. In short-term perspective, I'm sure there will be some flows and ups and downs. Still, if you'd be able to look at this in a long-term perspective, I'm sure we'd be able to really progress in a more optimal pace. Just like I mentioned also from Mr. Shinkai, looking at our current operation, cost is increasing. We are actually feeling that, especially the procurement cost. When we manufacture, the utility cost and labor cost, it's all rising. It's not exactly like a deflationary trend that we've been finding in the past.
I mean, in the past, if we just wait, we'd be finding all the costs go down, but then maybe the paradigm has already shifted now. That's what I feel. Also, how are we going to progress ourselves? That really goes back to today's theme. I'm sure it's going to be a future theme as well. It's really about how we'd be able to enhance the value. It's not for each device. It's really about user experience. It's really about digitalization. It's really about expanding the scope of the value we'd be able to add to this, the offering or the solution we'd be able to offer. For example, in the past, we would just try to measure the weight of the semiconductor in thinking of what the price would be. It's more going to be a bit different.
It's not going to be a value that you can just measure in weight. I think semiconductor is really going to be the center of this new paradigm. It is going to take time before we'd be able to actually feel that and see that, but it is really the direction that we need to pursue. If we'd be able to achieve that trend, then that short-term ups and down should be balanced. We should be able to absorb that. That's how I feel. Thank you. Thank you.
Thank you. Next question is from Fujiwara-san from Citigroup. Please unmute yourself and begin your question.
Thank you. This is Citigroup Securities. My name is Fujiwara. I also have 2 questions, if I may. The first question regarding the margin resilience. This is a question regarding margin resilience. In this down cycle, the margin is not likely to go down significantly, so I think you're managing quite well. In this minor down cycle, what is the headwind and what is the tailwind, if you will? I think because those are mixed together in this cycle right now. In this down cycle, what was the major tailwind for you? In the next down cycle, you may have employed countermeasures against the headwind. What will become useful for you in the next down cycle? What is your expectations for that? Can you share that projection?
That would be appreciated. That's my first question. My second question is about the power semiconductor related investment. The gross margin looks inferior compared to other products you said, but the power exposure, automotive overall or maybe in other aspects, to what extent do you think you can expand going forward? If you have an image of that would be appreciated. Can you talk about them?
All right. The first question will be answered by Shinkai-san.
Tailwind and also the headwind. In that regard, I would say that if you look at I talked about the bridge in the growth margin from this year and from last year and this year. The rise was a good tailwind for us because the how to control that is going to be very important as we see increase in the depreciation as in line with the production increase in the future. If you look at the far-right block, the overall cost increase and the mix improvement and the price hike, those are well balanced today. That's the successful factors this time around. Raw material prices and the hardware raw material prices and price hike and also the mix, what's going to happen to them going forward?
That will be affected heavily by the environment, so we have to take them into consideration. We don't have a straightforward answer, but these are going to be very important elements, so we would like to keep a close eye on these developments going forward. The other thing I will add here is that the factory utilization hovering around, that will have a 100 basis points impact with a change of 10% utilization. As you may recall, from around mid-last year, we started putting a brake on our activities, and that was criticized that we have started to take actions too early. We'll try to put our brakes to ourselves early on so that we can take actions when need be.
As a consequence, we were able to keep our inventory at a very low level. We are now, when we start trying to increase inventories, that will sustain the utilization of factory, and that is the case today. Although this is an internal factor, but I think this has turned positive and as a tailwind and underpinned our performance. Even in the down cycle in the future, if we can manage in the same way, I think we shall be able to moderate the changes of our margin trend. We talked about the inventory increase or decrease. I think we have to agilely work on those controls, looking at the trends of the market.
Of course, we just started our activities in the power space, so we cannot talk big and declare 100 billion and hundreds of billions, and we don't have that significant target right now, so we don't want to disclose that either. However, no matter what we think about it, EV is the most typical application, but even other than EV power, especially centered on renewables, this is going to have electricity close to carbon neutrality, and it's, I think that's a straightforward linear expansion that we can definitely expect. Power, I think We are expecting that this will become a significant portion to some extent in our business, but unless we are able to catch up with this production, this will only be a pie in the sky.
Therefore, we have to make sure to ramp up our production, and also we'll have to consider our production plan at different factories going forward and decide on what would be the optimal level and also decide on the margin. Those are the things that we have to consider going forward. That's it. Thank you.
A supplemental cover question, a follow-up quick question regarding power. Automotive, in the automotive sector, I think, you are comparable to the market. I think that is the ambition you have to stay comparable to the market. Also for power, are you trying to catch up with the market? Is that your immediate target?
For power, we are starting from a very small base for now. As for the market share, we have an ambitious plan to expand significantly because our size is very small today. According to estimate, even with IGBT, we are slightly less than 10%, I believe, at the current moment. We would like to aggressively and significantly expand this area, including IGBT. That's the plan. Thank you.
Thank you. Understood very well. Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you very much. Now we'd like to take question from Mr. Kojima from Nikkei BP. Can you unmute yourself?
This is Kojima from Nikkei BP. I hope you can hear me. Yes, we can. Yes, we can hear you. Oh, thank you very much, as always. It's really like a follow-up to the earlier question. I wanted to ask about power semiconductor as well. On slide 11 of what Mr. Shibata's presentation, I think you were talking about IGBT and SiC. I think you had a slide like that. SiC, when you say SiC, you're going to manufacture for the time being in Takasaki, is that correct?
Yes, that's right.
Look, aren't you also going to manufacture in Kofu? Do you have any plans like that?
At this moment I can't really say, but at this moment Kofu is for 12 inch. We want to have Kofu focus on 12 inch, and SiC is not going to go for 12 inch, which means it's going to remain in Takasaki. Of course, we don't know what the future could be, but that's the current plan.
Thank you. At a point of, 1025, let's say you wanted to ramp up and then SiC and IGBT, what is going to be the scale that you have in mind?
Still small. As I see at the moment, at the point of FY 2025, it's just going to be like a peanut size business. Just got started, something like that. It's going to be like second phase and third phase from 2026, year 2026. That's what we have in plan. In terms of IGBT, if things go steadily and well, thinking from the current scale, it's probably going to double or triple. It should become quite large at the point of 2025.
Thank you. IGBT, you mentioned like 10%, under 10%, is that going to be the share of the current market?
Yes.
Thank you very much. That's it for my question.
Well, it's not exactly IGBT, but within EV, the IGBT share within EV.
Got that. Thank you very much.
That's just our assumption, mind you.
Got that point too. Thank you very much.
Thank you very much. We are almost running out of time. This will be the last question. From Goldman Sachs, Daiki Takayama-s an, please unmute yourself and begin your question.
Thank you very much for the opportunity. Let me ask my question. Regarding M&A and capital allocation, and also M&A including capital in the context of capital allocation. In the period up to 2030, I think you're basically planning your target based on organic growth. In addition to that, do you think it is meaningful for you to add sizable M&A in addition to organic growth? That's my first question. You're also looking into software related acquisitions. What are the areas that you still need to complement at this point of time? That's my first question.
Yes. Our plan remains basically unchanged. Software, digital will be the centerpiece of our activities. I think we need to make sizable acquisitions or investments in these spaces. Also, this is something that we have been talking from before, connectivity and compounds, those are the things that we would like to reinforce. Depending on the deal and depending on the project, the size will vary from small ones to quite large ones. I think we're looking at a broad range here in terms of size investment. Because it depends on the counterparty, this is something we cannot really foresee, we have to keep a very wide spectrum in mind and continue thinking. That's the current status.
Let's say in 2030, towards 2030, in order. Do you have that? In order for you to achieve a certain revenue size, are you looking into acquisitions? Maybe you have to consider that your organic path will not allow you to achieve that revenue. Will that be an approach that you can take?
I will not rule out that possibility, but that is not our mindset today. The acquisition that we are thinking about right now are perhaps the PL impact, I believe, is not going to be that significant, even if we carry out a sizable M&A. It's rather complement our missing capabilities or shortcomings, if you will. In that regard, it's not going after the numbers. It's like, in order for us to be comparable with our peers in that respective sectors, we would like to add those tap-ins to complement our capabilities. In terms of revenue, as we have been talked about, talked before, and this will be covered by Sailesh and Vivek later, we would like to continue on with the plotted line, and that is a strategy that we are planning to follow.
Thank you very much. My second question is about the SiC. Once again, can you share with us what is the strength that you can expect by going into this space, from now onwards? Because all the other peers are well advanced in the SiC space. Can you explain what's the reason why you have decided to go in here? Also, when it comes to supply chain, in terms of procurement of raw materials, have you confirmed?
As for the second part of the question, the raw materials, I expect to see, as we have discussed before, for SiC still at this point of time, I think the SiC is still at the early phase of the business. Silicon is a very mature market, so I think a different approach is definitely needed for silicon carbide. I think we would like to broadly look into partnerships. That's my answer to the first question. The first part of the question, does it make sense for us to enter this space at this point of time? The same applies to IGBT. We are also a latecomer, a significant latecomer in these spaces for SiC and IGBT. Of course, it's very difficult to quantify.
Perhaps I would say, one of the strengths that Renesas has that cannot be quantified is around power. We are capable of developing something very efficient. Silicon carbide and also for IGBT, we are a very significant latecomer. For the current generation and for the future, I think, we are receiving a great review because of our performance from the customers. The same applies to IGBT, we would like to spend a proper amount of time. If we can build on our current initiatives, I am sure that we shall be able to enjoy great recognition from the customers. As of now, the technical expectations and also looking down into the future, the supply is going to expect to be not enough.
All the customers around the world are showing strong interest, and we are receiving a lot of very powerful inquiries from those customers. I think there's plenty of space still available, and I think we are well positioned to increase our market share even if we enter the space from now onwards. Thank you. That's all.
Thank you very much. We have received other questions. However, due to time constraints, we would like to close this Q&A section for now. We would like to now invite Senior Vice President, CSMO, and Head of Global Sales and Marketing Unit, Chris Allexandre. Chris, the floor is yours.
[Foreign language] Okay. We would like to entertain questions. If you do have questions, please use the Raise Hand button on the Zoom screen. Due to time constraints, we'd like to restrict the questions to two per person. Well then, from UBS Securities, Mr. Yasui. Please unmute yourself and present your question. The next question, Rodney Ray, please unmute yourself and begin your question. Thank you very much. The Bank of America Securities, we have Mikio Hirakawa. Thank you very much. There appear to be no further questions, and therefore, we would like to close this Q&A section for now. We would like to thank you, Chris. With that, we would like to invite Vivek Bhan, Senior Vice President. The floor is yours. We ask for your patience as we prepare for the presentation. Thank you very much, Vivek. The floor is yours.
Thank you very much. We'd like to open the floor for our question. Due to time limit, we would like to limit two questions per one person. First, we would like to ask Yamamoto-s an from Mizuho Securities to ask your question. Please unmute yourself.
Yes, this is Yamamoto from Mizuho Securities. Thank you very much for taking my question. I have a question for power semiconductor. Please wait for a second. Sorry.
Yeah, please, continue.
Yes, my question is about power semiconductor. You're going to enhance power semiconductor for auto. If you're going to enhance, at the same time, Renesas, is this related to how Renesas has become much strong to analog? Vivek, you came from Dialog, but then Renesas has also Intersil, has been acquiring a lot of other entities. Nowadays, the analog product has become much stronger in Renesas.
In that sense, even if it's for auto, do you believe the fact that analog portfolio is now becoming richer, is really enhancing, is really pushing, is becoming a boost, a driver to enhance SiC and IGBT? Do you think that's the case? It doesn't have nothing to do with that. In other words, with EV, there's going to be SiC, IGBT anyway. Because you have a technology, is it just about adding more, CapEx? How is the trend? Or how do you see it?
Thank you very much. Semiconductor Report's Sudar-san, please unmute yourself and present your question.
Thank you very much. Next, we'd like to take a question from Izumi-san, SBI. Please unmute yourself. Yes, thank you very much. EV and ADAS. Design-in and order activity is what I would like to ask about. I think like two years ago, I think we were hearing like ADAS was slowing down. I think that's something that we heard like two years ago. From last year, how has it changed? Do you think EV and ADAS would become more active in terms of sales activity? Do you think it's becoming more active? Can you share with us what your outlook is and what you see at the moment? That's my first question. In other words, EV and ADAS both are really active in the market at the moment. That's how you feel, right? Thank you.
My second question is about ADAS. The redundancy of the system is probably one important factor that you have to look at. When Renesas, how do you think you've been able to fully respond to the needs from the clients in terms of this redundancy issue?
Yes, thank you. I fully understand. Thank you very much.
We have received other questions. We need to close this Q&A segment for now. Thank you very much. Thank you very much, Vivek.
All right. Next, we'd like to invite, Sally Echeverri, SVP/GM Embedded Processing, Digital Power and Signal Chain Solutions Group.
Please give us a second to prepare. Thank you. All right, Sally, the floor is yours.
This meeting is being recorded.
Talk through our growth opportunities. When your core business grows, you have a.
Thank you. Now we would like to move on to the Q&A session. Please give us a minute until he becomes ready. All right. Now we would like to take some questions in the Q&A session. If you have a question, please use the Raise Hand button on your screen. In the interest of time, we would like to limit the number of questions to two questions per one person. Thank you very much for your cooperation. The first question will be from Goldman Sachs, Takayama-s an, please begin.
Please unmute yourself and make your statement. Thank you. The next from Semiconductor Portal, Mr. Tsuda, please begin your question. Thank you. There are other question, but we have already used up the allotted time, so we will now have to finish this Q&A session for Sailesh. Sailesh, thank you very much for your presentation. Next, we would like to move on to the presentation by our CHRO, Julie Pope. Julie Pope will make the presentation. Julie, the floor is yours. Please begin.
Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Please limit your questions to two each. Please use the Raise Hand button if you do have questions to pre-present. Please unmute yourself if you have questions. If you do have questions, please use the Raise Hand button on the Zoom screen. We will also accept questions from the same person. Well then, Nishioka-san, please. Please unmute yourself and present your question. Please present your question. Unmute yourself and please present your question. Please go ahead.
You have mentioned remote workers. When has that been introduced? When is remote working being introduced? Just for reference sake, from which country are they from? For midterm hires?
If there's a policy as to how many will be taken into account, if you could just share the numbers, that would be very helpful. Thank you very much. Has that encouraged more? Has that encouraged more people to recruit themselves? Thank you very much.
Thank you. Are there any other questions? If you have a question, please indicate by a push on the Raise Hand button on the screen. Okay, we now finish the Q&A session for this section. Thank you very much for your participation. Before we close, we'd like to ask Mr. Shibata to give a closing remark to wrap up today's session.
Yes, this is Shibata once again. I know it's been a long session, but then I hope because we have been able to do it for quite a long time, we've been able to provide enough information. Again, today's theme, the first theme that we discussed was about the softness and in this era of connection, be it target model or capital allocation. This is something that we do want to be given a little more time before we'd be able to share with you more information. However, compared to the past, when we have been really preparing ourselves, I think we have come to the point of time when we can feel a bit more aggressive.
For example, our own in-house inventory, I think we'd be able to build it up so that we'd be able to really be ready to really show robust growth when the market really becomes more active. That was the really first part of the message. The second part of the message, going back to Vivek's and Sailesh's presentation. The market opportunity, we do believe we're finding a very good market opportunity. It's actually accelerating at the moment, be it on AI or sustainability, or it could be about electrification of automobile. We know there's a wider scope of opportunity, and so it's really about how we'd be able to materialize that so that we'd be able to see it as our result.
It's really about the execution, I think this is something that we need to buy a little more time. The third message is related to go-to-market and product line or also going to what, I think it's all tied in into what Julie was able to present at the end. I hope that's what you felt. Again, the theme is to have one global Renesas, all Renesas. In other words, it's really about integrating our good aspects. It's really about uniting our force so that we'd be able to exercise what we're able to do to the world, to outside. I think this is, again, something that we'd like to buy the time so that we'd be able to show what we can, and I hope you'd be able to be a little more patient.
This time, we decided to change our format in launching our Capital Market Day. We again would like to keep on hearing your feedback, and depending on how the situation is in the market, how we are doing, how your interest would be, we'd like to hold another session like this. Once again, thank you very much for staying with us for a long time. Thank you very much.
Thank you very much. This concludes Renesas' 2023 Capital Market Day. Today's material and video, you'll be able to see it within our website. We expect to post the video clip from later on today. Thank you very much for staying with us.