From the Source's Mouth | Q1 2023

MANUFACTURER

REPORT SUMMARY

Earnings Call Release Date

Consolidated net revenue rose 8% year over year to $8.7B. Semiconductor Solutions' revenue was $6.8B, an increase of nine percent yearly. This segment represented 78% of total revenue. Infrastructure revenue was $1.9B and accounted for 22% of total revenue, a slight increase of 3% yearly due to growth in core software offsetting Brocade business softness. Plus, thanks to disciplined inventory management, Broadcom ended the quarter with less than 86 days of inventory.

AI revenue increased 10% yearly to account for about 15% of Broadcom's semiconductor business. AI forecasts indicate it will expand to 25% of semiconductor revenue in fiscal '24. Revenue is expected to exceed $1B in Q3 '23.

Semiconductor Solutions revenue was up nine percent for the quarter and should increase by the mid-single digit range next quarter. The breakdown by end market is as follows.
Wireless revenue dipped 24% sequentially and 9% yearly to $1.6B, representing 23% of semiconductor revenue. Next quarter's results will improve thanks to the seasonal ramp of the next-generation phone platform. Still, overall wireless revenue will only see a slight increase sequentially and be flattish year on year.

Within the networking market, revenue was $2.6B, an increase of 20% yearly. This market represented 39% of semiconductor revenue. One primary growth driver was the deployment of merchant Tomahawk switching for traditional enterprise workloads and Jericho platforms for telecommunication. The second driver was AI infrastructure at hyperscalers from compute offload and networking.

In addition, Broadcom's switching portfolio has the AI industry's highest performance fabric for large-scale AI clusters by optimizing the demanding and costly AI resources. Broadcom intends to expand networking technology into generative AI infrastructure, which will help networking revenue sustain its 20% year-over-year growth.
Within the broadband end market, revenue grew 10% yearly to $1.2B.

Meanwhile, for server connectivity, revenue was $1.1B, making up 17% of semiconductor revenue. This total represented an increase of 20% yearly, and the market should continue to grow within the low single digits next quarter.

The guidance indicates that consolidated revenue will be $8.85B for the next quarter.

Revenue was $62.14M, a decline of 25% from the quarter prior and down 31% yearly. Total automotive revenue was flat sequentially, and IoT was down due to customer inventory correction. Two logistics and ODM companies accounted for 10% of revenue, while WT Microelectronics was 49%. Chicony, an IoT manufacturer, was 16% of the revenue.

Despite the headwinds from the semiconductor market’s cyclical downturn, Ambarella is well-positioned to benefit from the uptick in demand for AI products. As of the end of Q1, AI represented 45% of total revenue.

Ambarella’s AI strategy focuses on improving deep learning processors and software by updating legacy and traditional learning methods. Ambarella will accomplish this through Ai inference, which involves implementing AI models for practical use by end users.

The CV2 family, Ambarella’s first AI-targeted product, has performed well. Due to the traction for this product, it will likely account for 60% of total revenue in fiscal year 2024. The CV2 family processes visual information in real-time, enabling object recognition, tracking and analysis. In addition, the processors within this product series are a significant improvement over Ambarella’s previous automotive SoCs, as they provide 40 times better performance. This advancement improves the functionality of applications like dashcams, drones and security cameras.

The profits from the CV2 family are already being used to develop the CV3 platform for mobility applications. This platform will enable the CV3 SoC average selling price to be five to 20 times higher than a CV2 SoC. This new and improved platform will add to Ambarella’s list of target customers, i.e., automotive OEMs.

For new products, Ambarella introduced the CV72S on March 21st. This product has six times the performance power over the CV2 family, allowing it to run Ambarella’s neural network-based image signal processing software. In addition to the automotive applications for the CV72S SoC, the CV72S is already sampling with leading IoT camera companies.

In addition, Ambarella has already researched running large language models on the CV3-AD High processor for the AI server inference market and believes its performance to be comparable to that of the Nvidia A100 but with lower power consumption and better overall system cost.

Revenue for Q2 should be around $60M to $64M. Automotive and IoT revenue will likely be flat as customers reduce their inventories.

Revenue was $1.322B, a yearly decline of nine percent and a sequential decline of seven percent. The largest end market was data center, representing 33% of total revenue. Enterprise networking was 27%, carrier infrastructure was 22%, consumer was 11%, and auto industrial was seven percent. AI also became the largest revenue driver and opportunity for the cloud-optimized silicon platform.

The most significant demand surges this past quarter came from the rise of the AI industry and its many applications within the cloud market. Marvell anticipates that its PAM4 optical DSP platform will benefit significantly from the AI trend, as AI applications require optimal connectivity. In addition, Marvell’s product is compatible with various network protocols, making it one of the best options for maximum breadth and flexibility. 
Marvell unveiled the industry’s first 1.6 terabit PAM4 DSP platform this last quarter. AI will drive the initial adoption of these products.

Furthermore, AI has become a core part of Marvell’s cloud-optimized silicon strategy as more cloud customers continue to improve their AI services via custom build accelerators.

By end market, data center was $436M, carrier infrastructure was $290M, enterprise networking was $365M, consumer was $142M, and automotive and industrial was $89M. The data center and consumer markets declined significantly, both sequentially and year over year. 
The decline within the data center market was primarily due to the storage portion of the business. However, storage is expected to recover within Q2, with more robust revenue results in the second half of the year. 

The carrier infrastructure end market had the most noticeable increase, with 15% year over year and 5% sequential growth. The expansion of 5G adoption led to strong demand for wireless products, resulting in about 25% sequential growth in wireless revenue. However, inventory digestion in the wired end market offset this increase.

In enterprise networking, revenue was $365M, an increase of 27% year over year and flat sequentially. These results stemmed from a substantial ramp in custom ASICs and reduced channel and customer inventory.

Automotive and industrial revenue declined by 10% sequentially to $89M. While automotive results were robust, industrial business was weak and decidedly offset the gains made within automotive.

Consumer revenue declined to $142M, a decrease of 20% yearly and 21% sequentially. However, forecasts indicate that revenue will increase sequentially in the mid-30% range thanks to demand for SSD controllers and ACD controllers.

Within the data center market, cloud revenue should grow 10% sequentially, while enterprise on-premises revenue will likely decline. Overall, data center revenue will be flat. Carrier infrastructure will decline as inventory digestion in the wired end market will continue to impact revenue. Inventory corrections will similarly affect the enterprise networking market, falling over 10% sequentially. Finally, automotive and industrial revenue will increase, but only in the low teams on a percentage basis.

In fiscal 2023, AI revenue was up dramatically compared to last year. This growth comes from the rapid advancement of AI technology, with the refresh rate currently around 18 to 24 months. In comparison, the refresh rate for standard infrastructure was previously four-plus years. Because of this, Marvell anticipates that AI revenue will likely double in fiscal 2024.
Overall, revenue for next quarter will be about $1.33B, plus or minus 5%. 

Q1 revenue was $4.28B, up 18% sequentially and 14% yearly. Globally, the accelerated computing platform market expanded rapidly, largely thanks to generative AI driving growth in compute requirements. The upside in demand came from increased customer transitions to NVIDIA’s accelerated computing, now known for being the most versatile, energy-efficient, and lowest total cost of ownership approach to training and deploying AI.

Within NVIDIA’s major customer categories, cloud service providers (CSPs) worldwide quickly deployed the flagship Hopper and Ampere architecture GPUs to meet enterprise and consumer AI application demand. Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud, and Oracle Cloud Infrastructure were among those that announced the availability of H100 on their platforms—additionally, CSP’s increased demand for the H100 from generative AI pioneers.

Second, consumer Internet companies also increasingly adopted generative AI and deep learning-based recommendation systems. Meta has implemented the H100-powered Grand Teton AI supercomputer for production and research.
Third, enterprise demand for AI was similarly robust within the automotive, financial services, healthcare, and telecom industries. This highlights how AI has already become integral to innovation roadmaps and competitive positioning. One such application was Bloomberg’s announcement of the 50B parameter model, BloombergGPT. Auto Insurance companies are also exploring AI applications and have already implemented a system for estimating repairs.

Because of the popularity of AI, NVIDIA began shipping the DGX H100, a Hopper generation AI system, which can be deployed on-site or via the cloud with DGX Cloud. In addition, NVIDIA also announced the NVIDIA AI Foundations, available on DGX Cloud. It gives businesses the tools to build, refine, and operate large language and generative AI models.

AI demand was also strong within the networking market, driving revenue for NVIDIA’s Mellanox networking platforms. However, general-purpose CPU infrastructure demand remains soft.

Gaming revenue increased 22% sequentially but declined 38% yearly to $2.24B. The sequential growth came from sales of the 40 Series GeForce RTX GPUs for notebooks and desktops. The launch of the RTX 4060 and 4060 Ti provides gamers with the latest architecture, with the 4060 coming in July while the 4060 Ti is already available. Additionally, AI will likely play a role in content creation and development to run time within the gaming market.

In addition, the partnership with Microsoft that intends to bring Xbox PC games to GeForce NOW has already delivered its first game, with more games planned in the coming months.

For Pro Visualization, revenue was $295M, an increase of 31% sequentially and a decrease of 53% yearly. The sequential growth stemmed from an uptick in workstation demand across the mobile and desktop form factors. Key verticals for this business were the public sector, healthcare, and automotive. In addition, the ongoing channel inventory correction has mostly righted itself and will be more stable moving forward.

Within the automotive market, revenue was $296M, a slight sequential increase of 1% and a significant increase of 114% yearly. The large year-over-year increase was led by the ramp of the NVIDIA DRIVE Orin for new energy vehicles. NVIDIA’s automotive design win pipeline over the next six years now represents $14B. The less significant sequential increase was primarily due to NEV customers in China adjusting production schedules after slower-than-expected demand growth.

Total revenue for next quarter will be about $11B, plus or minus two percent. The data center market will be a significant growth driver, mainly because of the forecasted increase in AI demand. NVIDIA has prepared for this demand by procuring a higher supply for the second half of 2023.

This quarter was Analog Devices’ (AD) 13th consecutive quarter of revenue growth, which reached $3.26B. Driven by the industrial and automotive market, the record results were ten percent higher year over year. Additionally, lead times continued to improve throughout the quarter, and now over 70% of AD’s product portfolio is shipping under 13 weeks.

Customers ongoing inventory corrections continued to affect revenue results, with the most significant impact coming from Asian markets. In comparison, demand within North America and Europe improved moderately. While this will likely continue throughout the remainder of 2023, AD is actively working to improve lead times and right-size the backlog of orders in preparation for a market rebound.

AD has embraced a hybrid manufacturing model to better adapt to the market’s frequent fluctuations. The combination of flexible production, a fortified balance sheet, and various products and customers has helped the company mitigate market weakness. These investment areas have led to numerous concurrent secular growth across all markets. AD has also taken steps to expose its business to markets surpassing macro uncertainty, such as digital healthcare, aerospace, defense, and the electrification market.

In particular, the company identified digital healthcare as an industry ripe for innovation. After a decade of R&D investments, the product portfolio has expanded to offer more advanced core signal processing, sensing and power technologies. Due to this strategic focus, the healthcare market has had seven record revenue years, totaling $900M annually. AD has become an industry leader in medical imaging, automation, instrumentation, and health monitoring. Notably, AD stands to shape the future of healthcare via advanced products utilized in ultrasound machinery. AD also plans to continue investing in robotic surgery to provide greater precision, flexibility, and control during surgery.

Next quarter’s revenue will be $3.1B, plus or minus $100M. Industrial and automotive revenue will be down sequentially, within the low to single-digit range. Communications will decline about 10%, and consumer will increase slightly. Lastly, demand in Asia deteriorated quickly at the onset of the quarter, which has pushed AD to reduce channel inventory in this region until the market recovers.

Revenue was $871M, supported by robust automotive, industrial, medical, and aerospace and defense sales. In particular, this was an excellent quarter for medical, aerospace and defense, as this marked an all-time high for sales of specialty products for these market segments.  

Automotive grew 6.2% sequentially to represent 33% of total revenue. OEMs in all regions have seen inventories rebound following the period of supply constraints that caused bottlenecks in the supply chain. In addition, demand continued to trend upward for electrification and ADAS features. 

Industrial was the largest segment for Vishay this quarter and represented 37% of total revenue. While sales were flat sequentially and below last year’s first quarter, European market strength prevailed. The most prominent trends within this market were manufacturing automation, smart infrastructure, and renewable energy collection and transmission.  

Medical grew 21.4% sequentially to represent 5% of total revenue, marking a new record for the medical segment. Compared to the first quarter of last year, revenue increased by 29.6%. Medical diagnostic equipment and implantable device demand drove the increase in revenue.  

Aerospace and defense also surpassed prior records and grew 10.9% sequentially to represent 7% of total revenue. The 33.6% year-over-year increase stemmed from growing demand for specific applications, like advanced radar and missile guidance systems. Due to its success, Vishay is now the leading supplier of passive components on the United States military-qualified parts list. 

Alternatively, distribution revenue was flat, and point of sales (POS) grew moderately in the Americas. Meanwhile, there was slightly lower POS in Asia. The only market to grow was Europe, whose POS grew by 6.2%.  

Despite the weakness in Asia, forecasts indicate that POS should improve in Q2 or Q3. 

By the quarter end, distributor inventories stayed flat at 19 weeks. Inventory rebalancing caused a decline of 7.4% in EMS revenue. Most inventory corrections were in the consumer, computer and telecom markets. 

Q2 revenue will be in the range of $860M - $900M. This total would only be about one percent sequential growth, primarily due to forecasts indicating the contract business with automotive customers will be flat. However, medical, military and industrial demand looks promising, so they will likely be the key revenue drivers in Q2. 

In addition, Vishay is focusing on expanding its silicon carbide technology portfolio, particularly for high-voltage programs.  

Regarding average selling prices (ASP), automotive pricing forecasts do not predict much fluctuation. Pricing for constrained products, such as power semiconductors and military products, should hold firm, but that could change depending on the product and inflation. Customers have reported that power semiconductors are the most constrained item, but MOSFET pricing has stayed stable.  

Meanwhile, there could be some pricing pressure for products in the diode and capacitor portfolio, but it depends on demand.  

Coherent Corp’s revenue was 6% less than the low-end of guidance but did grow 4% year over year on a pro forma basis to reach a total of $1.46B. This quarter, the communications market saw considerable market challenges, but the ongoing diversification efforts contributed to the strong performance across Coherent’s core markets.  

In particular, activity within the Materials segment and the continued success of the legacy business, now Coherent’s Lasers segment, contributed significant revenue. Networking achieved $551M in revenue, lasers reached $365M, and materials reached $324M. 

Coherent’s four major markets were communications, industrial, electronics and instrumentation. By region, North America accounted for 53% of revenue, Europe was the second largest at 20%, Japan and Korea represented 14%, while China was 11%. 

Datacom revenue fell from $332M, the total for the same quarter last year, to $294M. Telecom revenue also declined, although less significantly, from $245M to $222M. In the short term, temporary reductions in infrastructure investments will continue to impact the datacom market, but Coherent predicts that this decrease will recede in FY2024. The company remains confident that the fundamental growth drivers for the communications market will prevail in the long term, thanks to the increasing demand for hyperscale computing, artificial intelligence and machine learning.  

Additionally, Coherent has steadily seen demand increase for 200 and 400G data transceivers and is ramping up 800G shipments due to the growth expected in FY2024.  

In the telecom market, Coherent expects transceiver and disaggregated solution business growth to resume, resulting in a double-digit annual percentage increase. 

Semiconductor wafer inspection and spike annealing set a quarterly record within the laser segment, and outlooks for the rest of the calendar year are substantial. However, the forecasts for service business revenue in Korea have dropped due to leading display customers lowering demand outlooks by over 35% following a decrease in factory utilization.  

Due to weak demand in the Korean market, China surpassed Korea in spare display part sales despite sluggish mobile device demand. However, forecasts indicate that short-term consumer demand and inventory-related headwinds will ease at the end of Q3 alongside the release of next-gen smartphones and new-gen 8.5 fab investments. These funds will also boost OLED business recovery in 2024. 

This quarter was Coherent’s strongest scientific sales period since pre-COVID, as sales of ultrafast laser-based advanced imaging systems for neuroscience increased. 

For electronics, revenue was $139M, an increase of 121% year over year, boosted by transactions of consumer electronics for sensing. However, revenue will likely decline as design changes occur over the next 18 to 24 months. 

Outlooks for next quarter indicate that Coherent’s revenue will drop to around $1.125B to $1.175B. Full-year revenue outlooks show a range of $5.08B to $5.15B. 

Q1 revenue was $1.84B. Shipments of millimeter equivalent wafers decreased 18% year-over-year to 511,300 because of weak demand in mobile and consumer-driven end markets. In total, wafer revenue accounted for 87% of revenue totals for the quarter. The other 13% came from radicals, non-recurring engineering, expedite fees and other items. 

Smart mobile devices represented 38% of total revenue, with overall segment revenue declining 29% year over year. Low to mid-tier smartphone segment volume reductions and inventory corrections in the broader smart mobile market contributed to the decline. However, this was offset by increasing ASPs, premium tier mix growth, and content growth in RF transceiver and audio products. Inventory levels remain heightened in smart mobile markets but will likely normalize in the second half of 2023. 

The home and industrial IoT market grew seven percent yearly, accounting for 19% of total quarterly revenue. Growth was primarily due to the aerospace and defense business's strength and design wins from wireless technologies.  

Next-generation analog and mix signal technology demand will continue to climb. Inventory correction and market softness could curtail that growth, but trends within smart card, aerospace, and defense will likely offset those tailwinds.  

For the communication, infrastructure and data center end market, revenue grew approximately eight percent yearly to represent 19% of the quarter's total revenue. The market will likely improve in the second half of 2023. Still, ongoing inventory corrections in the data center and lingering demand weakness in the enterprise market will cause revenue to decline in the short term. 

Lastly, the personal computing end market declined 12% yearly to account for 2% of total revenue. PC notebook demand remains soft; forecasts indicate this won't change until next year. 

For the remainder of the year, overall shipment volumes will decline in the high-single-digit percentage range, offset by modest ASP improvements. Revenue for the next quarter should be around $1.81B to $1.85B, with non-wafer revenue representing about 10% of total revenue. 

First quarter revenue was $467.2M, down 3.1% from last year’s Q1 total of $482.1M and 5.8% from Q4’s total of $496.2M. By region, global sales were strongest in Asia, representing 68% of revenue. Meanwhile, Europe accounted for 17% of revenue, and North America was 15%.  

Seasonally lower revenue and economic slowdown significantly affected the consumer, communications and computing markets, resulting in these markets accounting for only 18%, 12%, and 22% of revenue, respectively. However, the combined revenue for the automotive and industrial end markets achieved a record 47% of product revenue. This marks the fifth consecutive quarter over 40%, seven percentage points higher than the 2025 target.  

Individually, the automotive market accounted for 18% of product revenue, an increase of 33% year over year. Demand was robust for DC-DC buck converters, LDOs, Ideal Diodes Controllers, bipolar transistors and TVs products. In addition, design wins are increasing for wireless chargers as customers increasingly seek thinner, lower thermal management systems with Diodes current monitor products, regulator transistors, and SBR products. There is also an uptick in demand for integrating Diodes products into stoplight, taillight, headlight, and cluster lighting systems. 

The power trend, which covers conventional hybrid electric vehicles and switching diode products, supports applications like drive train electronics, towing, and cargo management. Other products are also seeing traction in battery management systems and protection control applications for battery electric vehicles, plus plug-in hybrid EVs. 

Alongside Diode’s product mix improvement initiative, the company introduced 60 automotive compliance products this quarter. 

In the industrial market, revenue increased by 7% yearly to reach 29% of total product revenue. Demand for buck converters, LDLs and sensors for applications like PC, circuit breakers, millimeters embedded systems, precision control systems, and power tools and supplies are rising.  

For the communication market, design wins continued as expected for 5G applications for audio switches, IO expanders, USB switches, high PSRR LDOs, and Schottky products. Additionally, the growing industrial communication systems and cyber security market is creating demand for small signal diode products. 

While the consumer market saw some recovery, the expected resurgence in demand was slower than forecasts predicted. However, Diodes did secure several important design wins for USB switches, MOSFET current limit power switches, bridge rectifiers in sports camera adapters, gaming consoles and power-offering internet devices. 

In Q2 2023, revenue will be about $467M as the consumer, computing and communications markets continue to rebound gradually. However, automotive and industrial forecasts remain healthy. 

Revenue was $2.8B. By end market, cloud represented 43% of revenue, while client was 35%, and consumer was 22%.  

Within the client end market, revenue was $1B, a decline of 10% sequentially and 44% year over year. Lower prices across flash products and fewer client SSD and hard drive shipments for PC applications contributed to deteriorating market conditions. 

For the consumer market, market conditions were not much better. Revenue was $0.6B, down 22% sequentially and 29% year over year. The decline resulted from seasonally lower sales of retail hard drives and flash products, plus lower retail flash pricing.  

Nearline bit shipments increased 31% sequentially, but revenue declined 32% year-over-year. The drop in revenue stemmed from a dip in hard drive and flash product shipments. In addition, flash prices decreased this quarter, which was a significant headwind for this market. 

HDD revenue totaled $1.5B, a slight increase of 3% sequentially but an overall decline of 30% year over year. Despite the yearly reduction and modest sequential increase, overall HDD exabyte shipments did increase by 50% this quarter. The average price per hard drive also trended upward by ten percent. The uptick in pricing was 9% higher than last year. 

Flash ASPs declined by ten percent on a blended basis. Similarly, flash bit shipments decreased 14% sequentially but only dropped by 1% yearly. 

For the next quarter, forecasts indicate that HDD revenue will drop as cloud customers continue to work through excess inventory. Flash revenue will also drop, but there will be a modest increase in bit shipments, offset by lower ASP. Flash bit shipments will see accelerated growth at the beginning of fiscal 2024, but underutilization charges and pricing will affect total gross margins. Expectations for operating expenses are under $600 million. 

For the 2023 fiscal year, gross capital expenditures will be about $2.2B, and operating expenses will range between $580M to $600M. 

Net sales increased 2.9% sequentially and 21.1% yearly to $2.23B, a new record for Microchip. This quarter was the company’s tenth consecutive quarter of sequential growth.

However, customers were still navigating slow economic activity and uncertainty. These circumstances consequently increased push-out requests and backlog cancellations, which caused days of inventory to grow. Due to this situation, Microchip is pausing internal factory expansion, reducing capital investments for fiscal 2024, and will actively work to reduce inventory in the next several quarters. This plan aims to bring average lead times down to 26 weeks or less by the second half of 2023.

Mixed signal microcontroller sales broke another record, increasing 5.8% sequentially and 23.5% yearly, with 32-bit mixed signal microcontrollers growing the fastest. This business represented over 48% of fiscal 2023 mixed signal microcontroller revenue.
Analog business also set a new record, growing 1.9% sequentially and 19.9% yearly to reach $2.4B. This was the first time revenue broke the $2B mark.

In addition, FPGA product revenue exceeded $550 million, expanding by 31% compared to the prior fiscal year results.

In terms of market strength, Microchip is confident that industrial, including aerospace and defense, automotive and data center will continue to be resilient. In addition, supply has been stable thanks to the utilization of trailing edge capacity, which was the most constrained during significant shortage periods. Thanks to this, there was less opportunity to over ship to consumption, leading to less inflated inventories on the customer side. Finally, the focus on organic growth via increased solutions dedicated to trending demand has resulted in an uptick in design wins. This will lead to further share gains and revenue growth.

The order backlog for June is extensive, but Microchip anticipates that there will be additional requests to delay or cancel orders. Due to these circumstances, net sales will only increase between one to four percent.

Revenue reached $4.45B, up 4% sequentially, following adjustments made in the March quarter due to the more favorable conditions. The confidence that revenue would be higher than planned came from robust demand and resilience in the automotive and industrial markets, especially within e-mobility and renewables. In addition, the segments supporting the two verticals achieved over 30% operating margins. The strides made in decarbonization, digitalization, and dedication to enhancing customer solutions will continue to drive revenue.

Market conditions remain relatively the same as last quarter, with industrial and automotive applications being the strongest while consumer computing and communications business is declining.

Automotive revenue exceeded $2B for the first time, an increase of 11% sequentially. Overall, automotive accounted for about 50% of group revenue. As shortages and lead times ease for automotive components, EV and ADAS continue to support Infineon’s business’s resilience.

In particular, microcontrollers, specialty memories and power components were in demand this quarter. Automotive power has always been a critical category for Infineon, but this year marks the first time the company secured the number two position in automotive microcontrollers.

The robust demand for microcontrollers has pushed buyers to hold higher inventory levels. This trend marks a shift from just-in-time supply to just-in-case, indicating the desire for more resilient supply chains. Due to this, the market will cause the market to be tight through the end of the calendar year.

Supply limitations will also impact power parts related to vehicle electrification, mainly due to the increased demand for EVs and other renewable energy products. It will still be some time before the market transitions from allocation-based supply to normalized availability. Due to extensive long-term demand, the allocation-based environment will likely continue for high-power components.

The industrial application business segment also performed well this quarter, growing 12% sequentially and 30% yearly. Decarbonization-related products balanced out the weakness in home applications. Infineon’s products are leaders in the wind and solar power industries.

Because of the strength in the renewable energy market for industrial and automotive applications, Infineon plans to broaden and secure supply of silicon carbide-based materials. Infineon has already secured partnerships with two Chinese silicon carbide suppliers, focusing on providing 150-millimeter silicon carbide material to support the transition to 200-millimeter wafers.

Power and Sensor System revenue declined 11% due to consumer computing and communications weaknesses. However, residential solar installation and automotive charging were bright spots for demand. Despite this, revenue was still flat in these applications, and inventories remained elevated.

The acquisition of GaN systems was announced in February, furthering Infineon’s ability to provide gallium nitride-based solutions.

Lastly, the Connected Secure System market grew by 4% sequentially, driven by payment applications, embedded security and microcontrollers.

The second half of 2023 is forecasted to be stronger than the first half, as shortages are becoming less pervasive, and customers maintain steady demand in the face of contracting lead times. Revenue for the next quarter should surpass $4B. Automotive will increase, and green industrial power will be flat. Meanwhile, consumer and power and sensor system businesses will decline.

Total revenue for the year should exceed $16B.

Q1 revenue was $451.1M, an increase of 19.4% yearly and 1.9% lower sequentially. The decrease resulted from ongoing concerns with near-term business conditions and fluctuating sales. Despite this, demand for products with applications for artificial intelligence, autonomous driving, and power modules, plus customer engagement and design win momentum, drove revenue higher than in Q1 of 2022.

The breakdown of revenue by end market was:

• Consumer grew 19.5% sequentially to $63.4M.
• Automotive grew 8.2% sequentially to $105.3M.
• Communications grew 5.6% sequentially to $67.9M.
• Storage and computing were flat sequentially and totaled $119.8M.
• Industrial decreased 15.3% sequentially to $47.5M.
• Enterprise data decreased 31.1% to $47.2M.

Despite the sequential growth within the consumer market, year-over-year revenue decreased by 20.8%, dropping from 21.2% of MPS's total revenue to just 14.8%.

Alternatively, the automotive market expanded to represent 23.3% of MPS' first-quarter revenue compared to the 14.4% total in the first quarter 2022. This increase was primarily due to adoption of integrated solutions for advanced driver assistance systems, the digital cockpit and lighting applications.

In terms of inventory, MPS was able to bring days of inventory down from 212 days at the end of Q4 to 203 days.

For the Q2 outlook, revenue will be between $430 - $4590M. 

Revenue was $633M, consistent with outlooks provided in the last earnings call. The consumer segment saw lower-end market demand, and headwinds resulted from ongoing inventory corrections, mainly in the Android market. Despite lingering overinflated supply, QORVO made significant progress in clearing channel inventory.

The power device and defense market supported the high-performance analog business. The automotive market was stable regarding connectivity and sensors group but offset by excess supply digestion issues, weak end market demand for Wi-Fi products and cellular IoT. Design wins were the most robust across the following industries:

• Smart home.
• Precision location.
• Indoor navigation.
• Automotive connectivity.
• Automotive smart interiors.
• Enhanced human-machine interfaces.

Even with the excess affecting the Android market, revenue increased sequentially for the advanced cellular segment. After poor March results, Android forecasts predict revenue will grow in June.

QORVO also increased its presence in the defense market with its prototype R.F. multi-chip modules for BAE Systems. Production is mainly handled in the Richardson, Texas, facility, reducing manufacturing costs.

In addition, the green energy market will be a target vertical for the power device business. QORVO is confident that this industry will be a crucial revenue driver moving forward, considering the Department of Energy predicts that solar power will account for over half of the new capacity in the U.S. this year alone. Forecasts now project that the silicon carbide inverter business will reach double-digit compound annual growth through 2026.

Next quarter's revenue will be around $620M to $660M. Inventory will likely increase in June, but channel inventory will continue to decline. Historically, there was a 25% reduction in Android channel inventory in the March quarter, following a 20% decline in the December quarter. Other pockets of channel inventory may take longer to digest, but Android channel inventories should normalize this calendar year.

Total fiscal 2024 revenue will be above fiscal 2023, thanks to dollar content growth amongst QORVO's largest customers. 

Revenue was $9.3B, above the midpoint of guidance.

Handset revenue grew 6% sequentially to $6.1B, thanks to the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 launch. IoT revenue was $1.4B, resulting from slow demand and overinflated channel inventory. Finally, automotive revenue was $447M, an increase of 20% yearly, led by sales of the Snapdragon digital chassis.

The chipset business saw revenue reach $7.9B while licensing business revenue was $1.3B. However, Handset demand was affected by fluctuating macroeconomic conditions, and because of this, inventory drawdown will continue for the next several quarters. In addition, the predictions surrounding China’s recovery in the second half of 2023 are not promising.

As Qualcomm works to balance supply with demand to grow revenue, the focus will be cutbacks in investments where possible while maintaining automotive and IoT growth opportunities. In addition, the company is keeping a pulse on the AI market and is positioning itself to benefit from the trending demand in device categories ranging from smartphones to PCs. Finally, Qualcomm will also target the trends focused on energy-intensive and expensive cloud computing infrastructure.

Revenue for the next quarter will be between $8.1B to $8.9B. Android and automotive revenue will be flat, while IoT growth will be minimal.

Revenue for Q1 was $5.4B, a decrease of 9% yearly. However, cloud and embedded revenue grew significantly; more than 50% of overall revenue came from data center and embedded product sales.

Data center revenue reached $1.3B, flat year over year, with increased cloud sales offset by a decline in enterprise server processor sales. EPYC CPU sales grew yearly but dropped sequentially due to inflated inventories.

Enterprise sales declined yearly and sequentially because of macroeconomic uncertainty. However, the enterprise pipeline did extend this quarter, and there were multiple wins with several Fortune 500 companies in the automotive, technology and financial industries. In addition, leading providers in the enterprise industry showed demand for the new Genoa server platforms, which would be compatible with the third-gen EPYC platforms these customers are already utilizing.

Bergamo, the first cloud-native server CPU, and GenoaX, the fourth Gen EPYC processor with 3D chiplets, are all on track for planned launch dates. Despite mixed server demand forecasted for Q2, AMD is well positioned to grow its cloud and enterprise footprint by the second half of 2023 with a positive response for the performance and advantages of the Genoa, GenoaX and Bergamo products.

Within the networking market, AMD expanded its data center product portfolio with the new ASIC-based Alveo data center media accelerator. AI activity also increased this quarter as AMD focused on growing its customer base, which included further developing software ecosystem support offerings. Demand is rising in this market for the next-generation Instinct MI300 GPUs, which have AI training and interface for large language models. This comes after researchers announced using the LUMI supercomputer, powered by 3rd Gen EPYC CPUs and instinct MI250 accelerators, to train the world's largest Finnish language model.

AMD has created a team dedicated to broadening strategies and building business within AI to target this market further.

In the client segment, revenue declined 65% yearly to $739M. This was in line with guidance, as the expectations set at the end of last quarter was that Q1 revenue would hit rock bottom for the client processor business. Despite the downturn, AMD expanded its leadership desktop and notebook processor portfolio by launching the Ryzen 7000 X3D series CPU.

The Dragon Range CPU drove demand for the mobile market. Production ramped up for Zen 4-based Phoenix Ryzen 7040 series CPUs. Client CPU sales will expand in Q2 and strengthen further in the year's second half.

Gaming revenue declined 6% yearly to $1.8B due to increased semi-custom sales and offset by a decline in gaming graphics sales. However, sales of Radeon 6000, Radeon 7000 series GPUs, and Radeon 7900 XTX GPUs did expand.

Alternatively, embedded revenue increased to $1.6B. Industrial, vision and health care, test and emulation, communications aerospace and defense and automotive customers drove demand. Adaptive computing solution demand is on track to grow as industrial vision and healthcare customers continue to adopt these offerings for advanced compute capabilities.

Communications revenue saw similar strength within wired customers thanks to infrastructure design wins moving to production.

Q2 revenue will be about $5.3B, plus or minus $300M, a decline of 19% yearly and flat sequentially. Client, gaming and data center business will continue to drop while the embedded segment is projected to grow. As a result, a minimal decline in gaming and embedded markets will offset client and data center growth.

Q1 revenue was $1.96B, above the midpoint of guidance, highlighting the strategy's success in streamlining the company's product portfolio, reducing price-to-value discrepancies, and focusing on silicon carbide business while enhancing global operations. As a result, Onsemi is on target to deliver $1B in revenue for the year, about five times the total revenue in 2022.

Despite the broad-based macroeconomic slowdown, demand for electric vehicles, ADAS and energy infrastructure was steady. Automotive revenue consequently increased 38% yearly but was flat sequentially, totaling $986M. In addition, automotive supply constraints have lingered and have yet to resolve.

The Power Solutions Group (PSG) earned $1B in revenue, an increase of three percent year over year. The Advanced Solutions Group (ASG) declined 14% yearly to $593M. Last, but achieving 32% yearly growth, was the Intelligent Sensing Group (ISG) at a record $354M.

Following the introduction of the Hyperlux Family, demand for image sensors in automotive spread to industrial automation and smart retail applications. However, automotive and industrial still account for much of the intelligent sensing business, currently above 95%.

Onsemi also leads the automotive ultrasonic sensor market with over 20 sensors in the latest EV models from leading European OEMs. 
Overall, automotive and industrial revenue accounted for 79% of the quarter total, compared to the 65% share in the prior quarter. The company's goal was to have 75% of total business within the automotive and industrial market by 2025, which onsemi has already achieved two years ahead of schedule.

Long-Term Supply Agreements (LTSAs), initiated last quarter, improved visibility for demand in consumer and computing markets. LTSAs increased committed revenue by $1B.

While other companies have struggled to reduce channel inventory, onsemi lowered its inventory by $79M sequentially to reach historically low levels of 7 weeks. In comparison, Q4 was at 7.3 weeks.

Q2 revenue will be about $1.975 to $2.075B. The automotive and industrial markets will continue to increase sequentially, while other markets will likely be flat or down, driving additional exits from onsemi's nonstrategic end markets.

Quarterly revenue grew 22% year-over-year to $184.3M. In addition, Lattice expanded its product portfolio by launching the sixth device family based on the Nexus platform and improved versions of multiple software solution stacks.

Industrial and automotive markets saw the most substantial growth, with revenue increasing 21% sequentially and 55% yearly. The uptick in market demand was concentrated in the expanded adoption of Lattice solutions across applications like industrial automation and robotics, plus automotive ADAS and infotainment systems.

Alternatively, the communications and computing market declined 9% sequentially but rose 4% year-over-year. The revenue dip was mainly due to weak demand across the server market. Despite this, Lattice believes this segment will be a long-term growth driver, especially within the content expansion and data center servers, new computing designs, and market expansion for wireless infrastructure and data center networking.

For Q2, revenue will be between $183 - $193M. Industrial and automotive, as well as communications and computing, represent Lattice's top two strategic markets. Forecasts indicate that revenue and growth within these verticals will continue to expand within the coming quarters.

NXP Semiconductors 

Total revenue reached $3.12B, about $121M above the midpoint of guidance but effectively flat year over year. Distribution channel inventory levels are around 1.6 months, or 49 days, below the long-term target. Days of inventory increased by 19 days sequentially to 135 days.

NXP's end market segments performed better than expected, with automotive recording the most growth and reaching a 17% yearly increase above the midpoint of guidance. The breakdown for end market revenue was:
•    Automotive was $1.83B
•    Industrial and IoT decreased 26% yearly to $504M
•    Mobile was down 35% annually to $206M
•    Communication infrastructure and other increased by 7% to $529M

China-exposed business had a slow start in Q1 but saw modest improvements throughout the quarter, particularly within industrial, IoT and mobile markets. Demand within North America and Europe was solid across all market segments.

Revenue for the year's second half is forecasted to be higher than the first half and total $3.2B, plus or minus $100M. This total represents a decrease of about 3% yearly. The automotive market should continue to grow throughout the coming quarters, along with communication infrastructure and other, but industrial and IoT will likely decrease alongside mobile. Only a third of NXP's portfolio has lead times above 52 weeks. The shortage market that has persisted over the last two years is likely ending as the company continues to work towards a balance between supply and demand.

However, constraints still affect several specific technology nodes, mainly within the automotive and core industrial segments. The continued adoption of xEV drivetrains and ADAS will continue to boost sales within the automotive market. Alternatively, while the consumer IoT business stabilizes, recovery still depends on a cyclical rebound. This environment is especially true for China markets.

Additionally, while the goal is to maintain the current inventory level, this may not be possible given the manufacturing cycle times and the state of demand. Pending improved market conditions, NXP may have to carry higher inventory levels. Internal factory utilization levels will be in the range of the mid-70s, down from the low 80s in Q1. Decreasing utilization should improve flexibility and streamline output to support the end markets with heightened demand.

Renesas Electronics Corp. 

Total revenue was JPY 359.7M ($2.68B), representing a 3.7% increase yearly and a sequential decline of 8.1%. Revenue in both the automotive and infrastructure IoT industries surpassed forecasts. However, work in progress for the quarter declined due to production adjustments. This trend will likely continue into Q2 and consequently cause the die bank to increase.

Renesas is tactically increasing the absolute value of inventory and weeks of inventory so there is plenty of on-hand supply to seize all available business. This strategy will align with plans to increase production in the second half of the year. Still, it will require cost reduction on raw materials, so there will be many factors in successfully navigating this initiative. 

Next quarter's outlook indicates revenue will decline 4.5% year over year but will increase by 0.1% sequentially. The current trend of declining demand within the PC market should bottom out in the second quarter, but the extent of recovery is yet to be determined. Lingering uncertainty within mobile, consumer, cloud and data center markets are casting doubt on market recovery. However, the electronic component industry remains optimistic that possible demand for server platform upgrades should positively affect the cloud and data center industries. Renesas is similarly excited about the possibility of AI's influence on these markets.

Renesas forecasts that there may be significant tailwinds from automotive OEMs in Japan and possibly China, pending economic stimulus packages being approved and implemented. The European markets saw substantial inventory buildup, so recovery within this market will depend on adjustments on the customer's side.

In addition, the ADAS and EV industries continue to grow. While these two verticals only account for 15% of the company's total automotive segment, the potential of this market may turn into a critical revenue driver depending on demand performance.

STMicroelectronics N.V. 

Net revenue for the quarter was $4.25B, thanks to better-than-expected demand within automotive and industrial markets. However, lower gains in personal electronics offset the strength in these markets. As a result, revenue decreased by 4% sequentially but increased by 19.8% yearly.

By product group, ADG revenue increased 43.9%, with double-digit growth recorded in automotive and power discrete businesses. On the other hand, AMS revenues decreased by 0.9%, mainly due to low analog and MEMs sales despite the uptick in imaging revenue. Alternatively, MDG revenues increased 13.2% thanks to higher demand surrounding microcontrollers and RF communications.

Automotive was one of the more robust markets this quarter, alongside the power and energy division of the industrial market. Due to healthy automotive market demand, STM is pursuing car electrification, specifically within silicon carbide, and has its overall number of silicon carbide programs. Currently, STM has 130 projects spread across more than 85 customers between the automotive and industrial markets. Around 60% of these customers come from the automotive industry. STM expects to produce about $1.2B in silicon carbide revenue this year, supported by silicon carbide MOSFET projects for traction investors and battery management systems. This past quarter already saw multiple design wins, such as the MCU for onboard charging applications and the SPC 5 microcontrollers for vehicle body control.

Within the industrial market, two main trends drove change and increased demand for semiconductor products. These trends included the digitalization of devices and systems and energy management and power efficiency improvements. B2B industrial saw an uptick in power energy, factory automation and robotics demand. Meanwhile, demand for consumer industrial products like battery-operated tools and home appliances continued to cool. As a result, Q1 design wins mainly concentrated on B2B, consumer and specialized products.

Factory automation, robotics and building control revenue also grew, which aligned with STM’s robust backlog and ability to support new orders. However, demand in the consumer industrial, communication infrastructure and networking (including data centers and servers) markets was soft. The continued decline in orders for personal electronics highlighted that these industries still have a long road to recovery.

Q2 revenue will increase 11.5% year over year and 0.8% sequentially at the midpoint to $4.28M. For 2023, STM forecasts that revenue will be approximately $17 - $17.8B, representing yearly growth of around five to 10%. Automotive and industrial will continue to be key growth drivers for 2023 revenue.

Wolfspeed Inc

Q1 revenue was $229M, at the high end of the guidance set after the last quarter. This total represents a 6% sequential increase over the $216M from fiscal Q2 of 2023 and about a 22% increase year over year. Power device products saw solid quarterly results and achieved more than 50% yearly growth. Merchant 150-millimeter silicon carbide substrate revenue also increased. While production challenges hindered revenue results at first and resulted in a one-time inventory drain, revenue levels will stabilize in fiscal Q4.

Mohawk Valley, which opened in 2022, continues to change MaxLinear’s business dynamics. Overall, the facility's scale, automation and wafer size advantages are forecasted to lower die costs by over 50%. 

Customer demand stayed steady throughout the quarter and supported the $1.7B in design-ins that Wolfspeed secured over the last several months. This total represents a new quarterly record for nonautomotive designs and highlights how Wolfspeed is leading the expansion of the silicon carbide market.

For the upcoming quarter, the primary focus will be expanding capacity and wafer supply for Mohawk Valley. Total revenue should be between $212 - $232M, but growth depends on 200-millimeter substrate capacity and the Mohawk Valley fab. Ramp up for Mohawk Valley will be a challenge due to variability in financial performance compared to an estimated growth trajectory.

Samsung Electronics Co.

Total revenue declined by 9.5% sequentially to KRW 63.7 trillion. Consumer sentiment continued to weaken throughout the quarter as worries about an economic slowdown influenced buying behavior. Geopolitical issues and global macro uncertainties only added to already strained demand.

Revenue mostly declined across Samsung's business units, except for the DX division, which delivered improved results. The moderately higher results stemmed from sales of premium S23 models, better sales mix for premium TVs and enhanced operational efficiency. On the other hand, the DS division, display/mobile panel business, network business, and digital appliance revenue declined sequentially. DS division profits fell considerably because of the memory market's increased inventory valuation losses, less foundry utilization, the ongoing effects of weak demand and customer inventory adjustments. 

Weak demand in North America and Southwest Asia also affected network and digital appliance revenue results. Furthermore, additional geopolitical factors like wavering economies and exchange rates significantly impacted the United States, European and Korean markets.

In particular, the macroeconomic slowdown affected the memory component industry. Customers' DRAM inventories remain elevated for servers. The excess and sluggish demand have pushed many hyperscalers to cut IT spending for their planned projects. The NAND market was similarly affected by these factors. High inventory and low demand have also affected the foundry business.

Alternatively, within the mobile and PC application business, customer inventories of finished goods within distribution channels have improved slightly. However, consumer sentiment has yet to recover.

In addition, despite weak demand in the smartphone market, the premium market recorded growth in volume and value year-over-year. Sequentially, the mobile experience division had increased sales and profitability.

SOC, sensor, and DDI demand dropped sharply, but mobile SOC volume zone sales increased alongside the new volume zone product. To expand on this application, Samsung launched a UWB-based short-range wireless communication semiconductor product called U100. Samsung is expanding its switch partnership with AMD to strengthen GPU competitiveness for mobile resources.

Samsung is addressing weak market demand by focusing on technological competitiveness, which includes two-nanometer gate-all-around processes, meeting the demand for DDR5 and LPDDR5x, along with other high-end products. However, forecasts indicate that Q2 will be challenging in terms of sluggish market conditions and continued hesitancy around bulk buying. Still, the company hopes to see improvements in the large panel business, A-Series smartphones and TV model sales.

Expectations for the year's second half indicate a gradual recovery and a rebound in global demand. Concerning rising markets, Samsung will be launching new CPUs for servers to address the demand within the AI industry. Products like these and other initiatives should address the increasing interest in DDR5 and LPDDR5x.

MaxLinear Inc

Intel Corp.

Revenue for Q1 was $11.7B, about $700M higher than the midpoint of guidance. Forecasts indicate that a modest recovery should materialize in the second half of 2023. Industrial, automotive and infrastructure demand was more robust than in other broad-based markets. In addition, stability is already emerging in the PC market as customers work through inventory corrections. However, the server and networking markets still have room to fall as cloud and enterprise remain weak.   

By business unit, CCG achieved $5.8B in revenue, which exceeded expectations set at the end of last quarter. Customer inventories within this segment remain elevated, but Intel anticipates the market stabilizing at the end of Q2.  

Data Center Group (DCAI) revenue was $3.7B, surpassing guidance. However, merging the AXG business with inventory reserves tied to exiting the server system business diluted DCAI margins. Still, within DCAI, the Programmable Solutions Group delivered record revenue for the second quarter in a row. Revenue increased by 36% yearly, and external supply improved to provide ample support for customer backlogs. 

Intel recorded total addressable market contractions across all CPU market segments, and demand will continue to be soft in Q2. However, Intel's CPU market share remained stable in Q1, and the ongoing ramp-up for the 4th Generation Xeon Scalable processor Sapphire Rapids is on track. CPU market operating losses were higher this quarter, primarily due to a decrease in revenue, an uptick in product costs, and investments in leadership products on new process nodes. The total operating loss was $518M. 

The PC market continues to work through inventory correction but is estimated to return to healthy levels by the end of Q2. Notably, the PC installed base is more expansive than initially predicted, and usage is well above pre-pandemic levels. 

Network Edge Group's (NEX) revenue was $1.5B, lower than forecasts predicted due to weakness in network and edge markets. Operating loss was $300M, offset by expense management and discipline. 

Mobileye outperformed underlying automotive end markets and achieved $458M in revenue, up 16% yearly. Content per vehicle also increased by 6% year over year. 

IFS revenue was $118M, including 67% sequential growth in packaging revenue—headwinds, such as increased factory startup costs, impacted operating loss totals of $140M. 

Intel is quickly mastering EUV technology with Intel 4 as the company's first EUV node. Intel 3 is on track, and Sierra Forest will begin shipping in the first half of 2024. Granite Rapids will be up next, with both products operating on Intel 3. More news will be released in Q2 for the Intel 3, Intel 20A, and Intel 18A. 

Intel also announced a multi-generation agreement with ARM Holdings to enable chip designers to build leading-edge mobile SoC designs on Intel 18A. 

Emerald Rapids, the 5th Gen Xeon Scalable, is sampling with customers and will launch in Q4 this year. Plus, the follow-up to the Sierra Forest, Clearwater Forest, is on track to come to market in 2025. 

Q2 revenue will be between $11.5B - $12.5B. Trailing consumption will continue for Data Center, Network and Client markets. Additionally, demand is strong within AI capabilities in cloud and across network and edge markets, and CPU and accelerator portfolios will benefit from AI market tailwinds.

Teradyne, Inc.

Q1 sales reached $618M, about $28M above the mid-point of last quarter's guidance. Semiconductor test revenue totaled $415M, SoC revenue was $347M, and memory was $68M. The automotive and industrial industries were key demand drivers for the SoC market. In addition, robust sales in flash final test and DRAM final test were the bright spots for memory market demand and revenue. 

System Test Group Q1 revenue was $75M, and tester utilization this quarter was the lowest it has been in over ten years. Low demand for System Level Testing (SLT) and HDD products was in line with guidance from last quarter and resulted in storage test revenue coming in at $34M.  

Weak market demand was concentrated in the Compute and Mobility SoC test market and highlighted the continued decline in this industry. In 2022 PC shipments fell by 20%, and shipments are forecasted to decline by 4% by year-end. Historically, the Compute and Mobility SoC segment accounted for over 70% of the SoC market, which is why the weakness in this market has had such a significant effect on the industry.  

The consumer market is in a similar position. Smartphone shipments dropped 10% in 2022 and will likely fall another 4% in 2023. SLT demand was weak because of its high level of exposure in the smartphone market, and consumer market demand was experiencing a downturn similar to the memory market. 

Within the memory market, oversupply is restricting investments in capacity expansion. However, the transitions happening in technology are currently driving test demand, particularly for LPDD45 and high-speed flash. As a result, the memory market will likely stay on this path, and sales will be flat or down 10% from last year's level of $1B. 

In Wireless Test, revenue was $39M due to weak PC and smartphone sales. Headwinds also came from low investments in complexity-driven tests, as Teradyne focuses on rolling out Wi-Fi 7 at the start of 2024. 

Robotics revenue was $89M, with $72M coming from Universal Robots (UR) and $17M from Mobile Industrial Robots (MiR). These totals reflect a decline of about 14% compared to Q1 2022, which was the last robust quarter due to the impact of the Russia – Ukraine war and slow industrial growth. Despite the ongoing effects of the war and the decline in industry growth, shipments to Europe have reached new heights, whereas demand in the United States and Asia softened.  

While analysts can infer supply and demand trends, specific challenges affect overall market electronic component trends and revenue forecasts. These factors include: 

Varied market strength. While the automotive and industrial test markets are seeing strong demand, whereas the compute and mobility markets are slow. Tester utilization is higher for integrated device manufacturers (IDM), which drive this sector, compared to the outsourced semiconductor assembly and test (OSAT) companies that serve the compute and mobility markets. 

Wafer capacity expansion plans within the automotive and industrial industries indicate sustained demand, but these are long-term benefits that will not materialize in the short term.  

The test buy rate from China-based chipmakers is much higher than forecasts predicted and has already surpassed the demand recorded in 2022. The level of demand is currently unsustainable, especially when combined with the ongoing pursuit of R&D and design-in activities. However, a decrease in OSAT utilizations will significantly impact production capacity buys this year. 

The SoC market will likely fall 20 – 30% this year to around $3.3B - $3.8B, but Teradyne predicts its market share of the SoC market will increase to 38 – 39%. 

Despite the above challenges, forecasts indicate that Q2 sales will be around $625M - $685M. This total exceeds previous guidance due to the substantial strength in automotive and industrial semiconductor test demand. Supply has improved overall, but shortages still appear for some analog and logic devices, which will likely impact about 25% of tester revenue. Teradyne continues to realign distribution plans within the Robotics market, which will have a lasting impact over the next several quarters as the company shifts more resources to larger customers and OEM partners. Growth is forecasted to be minimal as this project continues.

Silicon Laboratories

Total revenue for the quarter was $247M, which met expectations at the midpoint of the guidance set at the end of last quarter. Globally, the European market was the strongest from both a sequential and year-over-year perspective. However, revenue was down for the Americas and APAC regions.  

Industrial and commercial business revenue was $151M, an increase of 19% year over year, with all major industrial and commercial subcategories showing growth since last year.  

Home and life revenue decreased sequentially and yearly thanks to lower demand for smart home products and heightened consumer product inventories. Distribution revenue accounted for 83% of total sales, with days sales of inventory (DSI) expanding to 79 days as the point of sale (POS) with some of Silicon Laboratories' distributors fell short of expectations by quarter end. DSI forecasts show a modest decline is likely for Q2. 

Last quarter Silicon Laboratories said it would increase investments in the IoT market to become an industry leader. This initiative drove the strong Q1 results, as the Bluetooth portfolio grew 65% yearly and 11% sequentially. In addition, design wins within this industry were significant and, compared to last year, were up 36%.  

Silicon Laboratories continues to expand its Series 2 portfolio, which includes the xG27 family and Bluetooth SOCs. These products are well suited for small battery-optimized devices, including connected medical devices, wearables, asset monitoring tags, and smart sensors. Silicon Laboratories also continues to promote the adoption of wireless technologies like Matter, which enables interoperability between smart home devices. 

For Q2, revenue will be between $238 - $248M. Capacity restrictions across process nodes are no longer a concern, which should create a healthier balance between supply and demand. While near-term volatility will continue to be a factor within the wireless connectivity and IoT industries, both markets will continue to grow.  

Furthermore, pricing increased at the onset of 2023 due to higher input costs. This pressure, as well as the strain coming from the competition within the market, will continue but is unlikely to affect long-term outlooks. 

United Microelectronics Corp. (UMC)

Q1 revenue totaled TWD 54.2B ($1.76B), a decline of 20.1% sequentially and 14.5% year over year. Geographically, the Asia market saw a more significant dip than initially forecasted, making up only 50% of sales, about a 4% decline. Overall, this quarter's most considerable headwinds came from sluggish wafer demand and customers' continued efforts to digest elevated inventory levels. Automotive and industrial market demand was the strongest, with automotive accounting for 17% of overall Q1 revenue. 

Operating expenses were lower than in Q4 2022 at TWD 5.78B due to seasonal declines and should not continue into Q2.  

Wafer shipments declined by 17.5% sequentially, but this was at the better end of previous guidance, which predicted a 17% – 19% decline for the first quarter. Utilization rates were also in line with guidance at about 70%.  

By segment, computer, consumer and communication revenues all declined. By nanometer technology, the revenue breakdown was: 

• 14-nanometer and below represented 41% 
• 28-nanometer totaled 26%
• 22-nanometer totaled 26% 

The company's capacity for Q1 was the lowest due to maintenance schedules interrupting output. This, combined with sluggish wafer demand and customers' struggling to digest elevated inventories, contributed to the decline in revenue.  

For Q2, customers will continue to work through inventory correction, leading to soft end market demand. Wafer shipments will be flat this quarter as a result. To combat this, UMC plans to strictly monitor and control costs to secure profitability in the near term. Long term, UMC will continue developing differentiated solutions across multiple specialty platforms, such as RFSOI and BCD. 

Texas Instruments Incorporated (T.I.)

Revenue met expectations at $4.4B, representing a 6% sequential decrease and an 11% yearly decrease. All end market results reflected weaker demand, except for automotive. Inventory correction drove the decline in demand, which will continue through Q2. 

By segment, analog revenue declined 14%, embedded processing grew 6%, and the ‘other’ segment declined 16% compared to Q1 2022. For sequential performance by end market, industrial market activity was flat; automotive market activity was up mid-single digits, communications equipment dropped in the mid-teens percentage range, while personal electronics and enterprise systems were down 30%. 

Operating expenses increased by 14%, indicating that the costs associated with manufacturing are continuing to rise and affect revenue. As a result, overall operating profits were $1.9B, or 44% of revenue and representing a decrease of 25% from Q1 2022. 

Looking ahead, Q2 revenue will be between $4.17B - $4.53B. T.I. will continue to invest in manufacturing and technology, a diverse product portfolio, and improve the reach of the company’s supply channels.  

Days of inventory are currently at 200 as T.I. has increased how much supply fabs can hold. As customers continue to adjust their excess supply, T.I. has no plans to decrease fab loading at this time.

Seagate Technology Holdings

Q1 revenue reached $1.86B, slightly below guidance due to economic uncertainties and ongoing inventory correction. By end market, the revenue breakdown was: 

• Hard disk drive revenue declined 4% sequentially to $1.6B 
• Mass capacity revenue was flat at $1.2B
• Nearline shipments increased by 9%
• Legacy market revenue went down 12% to $371M
• Non-HDD business grew 14% to a total of $256M 

A couple of factors drove the declines within these end markets. First, for mass capacity revenue, inventory adjustments, specifically for cloud customers, and weak demand in Chinese markets resulted in lower-than-expected revenue. The decline within the legacy market was steeper than anticipated due to more cautious spending on the customer end. Weakening server demand also added extra pressure. 

Alternatively, nearline shipments increased thanks to healthy demand for 20-plus terabytes capacity drives, which grew to represent two-thirds of nearline exabytes year over year. This uptick in demand showcases how customers are utilizing higher-density storage for their data center projects. Despite the positive change in nearline exabyte shipments this quarter, it is not expected to continue over the next couple of quarters due to cloud customers continued efforts to reduce inventories. 

The positive trend within the non-HDD business resulted from more robust sales of enterprise systems as component supply constraints and market coverage improved. 

Revenue for Q2 will be around $1.7B, plus or minus $150M. In terms of struggling markets, the mass capacity business will decline incrementally, and it is unlikely that data storage demand will recover within the next few quarters. Seagate will continue prioritizing investments in its HAMR-based products and is actively pursuing cost savings opportunities. By the conclusion of Q2, Seagate aims to be on track to deliver between $40 - $45M annually in cost savings. About 60% of those cost savings will come from goods sold. 

Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company Limited

Total revenue for the quarter was $16.62B. By technology, the breakdown of contributions to wafer revenue was: 

• 5-nanometer process technology made up 31%
• 7-nanometer technology made up 20%
• Advanced Technologies, 7-nanometer and below, was 51% 

Revenue for Q1 decreased by 16.1% due to weakening macroeconomic conditions and softening end market demand, which pushed customers to reduce their demand forecasts. In addition, lower capacity utilization and less favorable foreign exchange rates decreased gross margins by 5.9% to 56.3%. Total operating expenses accounted for 10.8% of net revenue, which came in lower than guidance due to expense controls and lower employee profit sharing. 

The breakdown of end market representation for revenue totals was: 

• HPC declined 14% quarter over quarter to a total of 44%
• Smartphone declined 27% to a total of 34%
• IoT declined 19% to a total of 9%
• Automotive increased 5% to a total of 7%
• DCE declined by 5% to a total of 2% 

Overall, revenue was affected by lower capacity utilization rates, which will continue to impact totals for this quarter. In addition, higher electricity costs in Taiwan hit TSMC’s bottom line. The costs associated with production will make diversifying manufacturing locations key for the future. The fab being built in Arizona is scheduled to begin N4 processing technology production in late 2024. Late 2024 is also the target for volume production to start in Japan's new specialty technology fab. In addition, expansion plans are in place for increasing the 28-nanometer plant in Nanjing, China, and construction in the Kaohsiung fab is on track for expanded advanced node capacity.  

To support these facilities, TSMC plans on hiring over 6,000 employees in Taiwan before year-end. 

In Q2, inventory adjustments and macroeconomic conditions will continue to influence revenue, which should be $15.2 - $16B. Revenue for the first half of 2023 represents a 10% year over year. Recovery will be a gradual process but is expected to take effect in the second half of the year. In particular, sizable N3 demand will likely be a critical factor in driving revenue higher.  

Forecasts indicate that semiconductor market demand, excluding the memory market, will decline by mid-single-digit percentages for the year. Demand within the foundry industry is forecasted to decline by high single-digit rates. 

ASML Holding

Due to quicker installation and system adoption, deep UV and EUV revenues were higher than ASML’s previous guidance. ASML shipped nine EUV systems and earned €2.9 ($3.2B) overall from 17 systems sales this quarter. Total revenue for the quarter was $7.39B. 

Net sales reached €6.7B ($7.27B). Net system sales were €5.3 ($5.84B), with logic sales accounting for 70% and memory sales making up the remaining 30%. Installed base management sales came in at €1.4B ($1.63B), below guidance due to a decline in revenue from customers upgrading systems. The decrease in the upgrade business was offset by EUV and deep UV immersion revenue, which pushed gross margin totals higher than the original guidance. Thanks to additional sales, gross margins reached 50.6% for the quarter, and total net income for the quarter was €2B ($2.48B), representing 29% of net sales and an EPS of €4.96B ($6.14B) 

Net system bookings for the quarter totaled €3.8B ($5B), with €1.6B ($2.11B) for EUV and €2.2 ($2.0B) for non-EUV bookings. Logic accounted for 79% of bookings, while the memory market accounted for 21%. Overall bookings were lower quarter over quarter, which aligned with forecasts. The backlog at the end of Q1 was about €39B ($51.4B), which is nearly double this year’s system sales. 

R&D expenses were lower than original forecasts and came in at €948M ($1.25B). 

Demand remained weak within the consumer technology industry by end market, while automotive and industrial demand stayed strong. Low demand on the consumer side pushed those in the industry to reduce their inventory levels and production utilization. Similarly, memory customers lowered CapEx and limited wafer output to create a better balance between supply and demand, which has yet to recover fully. Logic customers are taking the same approach to wafer output. However, both logic and memory customers are maintaining technology roadmaps and are still investing in strategic technology. 

Despite some customers adjusting their demand and supply forecasts, others in more high-demand markets are willing to fill the gaps in orders. In particular, deep UV has seen an uptick in demand, and domestic customers in China comprised over 20% of ASML's backlog at the end of the quarter.  

China's market share of allocation for system revenue will likely increase, pending updates on the Dutch government's export control restrictions. ASML plans to apply for export licenses for advanced immersion Deep UV systems shipments. Currently, expectations surrounding the licensing policy changes are not expected to impact ASML's 2023 financial outlook. 

In Q2, net sales are expected to be around €6.5 - €7B ($8.58 - $9.25B). Installed base management sales should be approximately €1.3B ($1.71B). R&D expenses will be slightly higher, around €990M ($1.3B), to support product roadmaps and improve installed base performance. System demand will continue exceeding capacity this year, but current production plans should support shipping around 60 EUV and 375 deep EUV systems. About 25% of the deep UV systems will be immersion.