Semiconductor Lithography Equipment Provider ASML On Track To Meet Guidance
ASML has published its 2012 first quarter results.
Net sales were €1,252 million, up from €1,211 million last quarter. Of these, service and field option sales were €218 million and €202 million respectively. Net income was €282 million, slightly down from Q4 2011's €285 million. There was not much change in gross margin which was 41.8%, up from 41.0% in Q4 2011. EPS reduced a small amount from €0.69 in Q4 2011 to €0.68 this quarter.
The number of new systems sold in Q1 2012 was 47, as compared to 35 in Q4 2011 but the number of used systems sold reduced from 6, last quarter to 5 this quarter.
Net bookings, excluding EUV increased from 710 to 865 this quarter, although the number of units ordered excluding EUV was almost the same at 36 in Q1 2012 and 37 in Q4 2011.
Net sales are expected to be stable in Q3 2012 at H1 levels.
"Our financial results in the first quarter were in line with guidance, supporting our expectation for first half 2012 net sales of about €2.4 billion. We see sales stability at current Q1 levels for the next two quarters with clear indications that the Logic segment will continue its strong demand trend for the remainder of the year," says Eric Meurice, President and Chief Executive Officer of ASML.
"The sales trend is driven mainly by demand from Foundries and Integrated Device Manufacturers (IDMs), which will represent the majority of our sales in the next two quarters. The demand for 28 nanometre (nm) from this Logic segment continues to be large and structural."
"It will be accompanied by the start of pre-production capacity for 20 nm. Later in the year, we expect to see technology demand for sub-20 nm NAND memory and sub-30 nm DRAM memory. Our sales will come mainly from TWINSCAN NXT:1950i immersion technology and will be complemented by a sustained KrF capacity build in Logic as the new nodes require the capacity build-up of the full range of layers," he continues.
"Our EUV technology has made significant progress as evidenced by the press release highlights: we continue to improve the efficiency of the system to reach our objective of 60 wafers per hour in the second half of 2012. We are preparing the shipments of the first 11 production systems on order, the NXE:3300B, from Q4 2012 to the summer of 2013. These units will serve our customers in their production recipe development. We have now started the negotiation of a new batch of orders for EUV systems, targeted mainly for customer production ramps," Meurice adds.
First Quarter 2012 Highlights
TWINSCAN NXT:1950i has surpassed the productivity milestone of more than 4,500 wafers in a single day at a customer manufacturing site, just six months after ASML set the record of more than 4,000 wafers per day.
As part of its Holistic Lithography portfolio, the firm's computational lithography unit Brion introduced Tachyon Flexible Mask Optimisation (Tachyon FMO). This enables the seamless use of multiple Optical Proximity Correction (OPC) techniques in a single mask tapeout.
Of its new Extreme Ultraviolet (EUV) lithography platform, all six NXE:3100 systems are now operational and printing wafers; the revenue for the sixth system installed in Q1 2012 was recognised in Q1 2012, one quarter earlier than expected.
The number of exposed wafers on NXE:3100 systems increased to about 9,000 wafers. The NXE:3100 systems have achieved on-product overlay of 6 nm as well as dedicated chuck overlay of less than 2 nm.
An EUV light source supplier has demonstrated 30 W at a high duty cycle with acceptable dose control for a sustained period of time. In addition, it demonstrated 50 W of raw power, successfully applying pre-pulse technology.
Assembly and integration of our the new NXE:3300B EUV scanners - the volume production successor of the NXE:3100 - is ongoing, with first shipment expected in the fourth quarter of 2012 and revenue recognition expected starting early in 2013. Upto now, a total of 11 NXE:3300B systems have been ordered; semiconductor device production using EUV is expected to begin in 2013.
For the second quarter 2012, ASML expects net sales of about €1.2 billion, gross margin of about 43 percent, R&D costs at €145 million and SG&A costs at €55 million.
Update on share buyback program
As part of ASML's policy to return excess cash to shareholders through dividend and regularly timed share buy backs, ASML has announced its intention to purchase up to €1,130 million of its own shares in the two year period 2011-2012. Since the start of this program in 2011 up to April 1, 2012 the firm has purchased 29.8 million shares for a total consideration of €839.2 million. The repurchased shares have been, or will be cancelled.
What's more, ASML has announced its intention to purchase up to 2.2 million additional shares during 2012 in order to cover outstanding employee stock and stock option plans. These shares will be held as treasury shares pending delivery pursuant to such plans. Up to April 1, 2012 no shares had yet been purchased under this program.
The share buyback programs will be executed within the limitations of the existing authority granted by the AGM on April 20, 2011 and, if granted, of the authority proposed to future AGMs. ASML stipulates both share buyback programs may be suspended, modified or discontinued at any time.
