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Advanced Energy Industries, Inc. (AEIS)

Q1 2013 Earnings Call· Tue, Apr 30, 2013

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Good day, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Advanced Energy Earnings Conference Call. [Operator Instructions] As a reminder, this conference is being recorded for replay purposes. And I would now like to turn the conference over to your host for today, Ms. Annie Leschin, Investor Relations. Please proceed.

Annie Leschin

Analyst

Thank you, operator, and good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining us today for our First Quarter 2013 Earnings Conference Call. With me on today's call are: Garry Rogerson, Chief Executive Officer; Danny Herron, Executive Vice President and CFO; Yuval Wasserman, President of the Thin Films Business; and Gordon Tredger, President of the Solar Energy Business. By now, you should have received a copy of the earnings release that was issued yesterday evening. For a copy of the release, please visit our website at advanced-energy.com or call us directly at (970) 407-4670. I'd like to remind everyone that except for the historical financial information contained herein, the matters discussed on this call contain certain forward-looking statements subject to known and unknown risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied by such statements. Statements that include the terms believes, expects, plans, objectives, estimates, anticipates, intends, targets, goals or the like should be viewed as forward-looking and uncertain. Such risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to, the volatility and cyclicality of the industries we serve, the timing of orders received from our customers and unanticipated changes in our estimates, reserves or allowances, as well as other factors listed in our press release. These and other risks are described in Forms 10-Q, 10-K and other forms filed with the SEC. In addition, we assume no obligation to update the information that we provide you during this call, including our guidance provided today and in our press release. Guidance will not be updated after today's call until our next scheduled quarterly financial release. I'd now like to turn the call over to Garry Rogerson, CEO of Advanced Energy. Garry?

Garry W. Rogerson

Analyst

Good morning, and thank you for joining us. Overall results this quarter were in line with our expectations. Thin Films picked up while Solar Energy experienced a seasonal decline and also experienced some pushouts of commercial orders. Total revenues were $112 million with GAAP EPS of $0.17 and non-GAAP EPS of $0.29. As Danny will highlight in a moment, beginning this quarter, we are adjusting our non-GAAP EPS to exclude certain items to more accurately reflect the cash earnings power of our model and be consistent with our peers. This does not affect our aspirational goals but does help us show you the path towards them. Our strategy to create an exceptionally efficient business model that we expect to capitalize on the peaks and profitably manage through the troughs in our industry cycles is coming together. Since November 2011, we have reduced our cost by more than $30 million with a line of sight and expectation for another $25 million. We have established a streamlined model for our manufacturing and are maximizing our supply chain and outsourcing opportunities. We have lowered our company breakeven and generated $111 million of cash. We have profitably endured a trough in our Thin Films business while continuing to grow our solar business. In short, we are successfully executing on our strategic plan and aspiring to meet our goals. We believe that all of the steps we have taken are creating a strong foundation from which we can now focus on accelerating profitable revenue growth. To do this, we are developing more efficient R&D in select worldwide locations close to our customers, establishing more efficient localized distribution and acquiring new technologies and product lines, such as Solvix and our recent acquisition of REFUsol, to add to our core competences. REFUsol meets our acquisition criteria. From…

Yuval Wasserman

Analyst

Thanks, Garry. Beginning with Slide 9. Revenues from our Thin Films business increased 16% sequentially in the first quarter to $61.8 million. For the first quarter in more than a year, all of our Thin Films businesses, save renewables, showed sequential improvement. Coupled with efficiency gains from our many cost reductions, operating income also grew to $7.5 million or 12% for the quarter, up from 9% last quarter. Design wins were once again strong this quarter. We captured more than 3 quarters of the opportunities we pursued, winning 80% in semiconductors and 75% in thin film industrials. Leveraging a new engagement model with key OEMs, we have increased our penetration in important semiconductor growth areas, such as etch and sputtering. As the semiconductor industry moves to triple and quadruple profiting techniques and 3D device geometry, more etch steps are required. This is opening up opportunities with various external suppliers, where we are capturing new designs slots. Additionally, as more our etch patterning steps are needed for advanced generation devices, we are winning designs that are positioning us for future revenue growth. These trends, along with our growing abatement business, are some of the reasons behind the increases we see in our semiconductor business. In thin film industrials, our wins stem from touch panels in Asia to Low-E glass in China and from etch applications for large area and small screen flat-panel displays, where we provide high-power RF generators, to film depositions for handheld device touchscreens, where we supply DC and RF power generators for sputtering and PECVD applications. Turning to our performance on Slide 10. Sales for semiconductor applications increased due largely to capacity buys at 28 nanometers and initial technology buys at sub 20 nanometers nodes, which requires increased etch content. Sales of abatement equipment also performed well, driven…

Gordon B. Tredger

Analyst

Thanks, Yuval. Turning to our Solar Energy results on Slide 12. Obviously, the big highlight in the last month was our acquisition of REFUsol and its 3-phase string inverter product line. But before I go into more detail on that, let me first review our results for the first quarter. We shipped 217 megawatts this quarter versus 228 megawatts last quarter, leading to revenue of $50 million or 45% of the company's total sales. The 15% sequential decline in revenues was a bit more than the anticipated coming into the quarter, though less than we had seen in recent years. Some commercial orders were pushed out during the quarter, due to weather, while others were affected by financing and permitting delays. First quarter operating income was roughly breakeven. As expected, margins were pressured again this quarter due to 1 utility contract that included some low-margin balance of system components. Turning to Slide 13. We remain encouraged by our prospects for the year, especially on the commercial side of the business, with a strong pipeline of opportunities unfolding as the year progresses. On the utility side, we see more opportunities emerging in the second half of the year as we ramp shipments of our new 1-megawatt inverter, the AE 1000NX, that is scheduled to begin shipping in the second quarter. This product offers the same benefits in lowering the levelized cost of energy, or LCOE, that our bipolar product lines has always delivered. There's significant economies of scale on large deployments. In addition, the 1000NX will offer a full suite of utility interactive controls and good support capabilities that will be relevant to transmission connected sites in places like Arizona. These features will also be very important for large commercial projects in the U.S. Overall, the 1000NX has been well received…

Danny C. Herron

Analyst

Thank you, Gordon. In today's call, I'll refer to both GAAP and non-GAAP results. As you saw in our press release, in order to give a more accurate picture of the cash earnings power of our financial model and be more consistent with our peers, we are adjusting our non-GAAP description. Beginning in the first quarter, non-GAAP measures will exclude the impact of restructuring charges, acquisition-related costs, stock-based compensation and the amortization of intangibles. A reconciliation of non-GAAP income from operations and per share earnings is provided in the press release table. Once again, I'd like to reiterate that the changes in our non-GAAP definition does not impact our $2 per share aspirational goal. Beginning with highlights of the first quarter on Slide 16. Total revenues were $111.8 million, a decrease of 1% sequentially and an increase of 6% compared with the same period last year. We ended the quarter with a strong balance sheet, including $182.3 million in cash and investments, up $10 million from last quarter. Turning to the revenue performance on Slide 17. Revenues for the Thin Films business increased 16% sequentially to $61.8 million. The majority of the increase was driven by sales to semiconductor applications, which grew 11% to $32.7 million from $29.5 million last quarter. Sales to flat-panel display applications showed a marked improvement as well, more than doubling to $8.7 million from $3.2 million in the fourth quarter. Sales from data storage and industrial applications rose 18% to $7.4 million compared to $6.3 million last quarter, as we saw an increasing contribution from adjacent markets due in part to our recent acquisition of Solvix. And finally, service revenues had a healthy increase, up 7% to $12.5 million. Sales in our Solar Energy business were $50 million in the first quarter, a decrease of…

Operator

Operator

[Operator Instructions] And your first question is from the line of James Covello of Goldman Sachs.

Mark Delaney - Goldman Sachs Group Inc., Research Division

Analyst

Hi this is Mark Delaney on behalf of Jim Covello. I was hoping you could elaborate a little bit more on the inverter product portfolio now that you have REFUsol. I know, Garry, you talked about wanting to augment the product line. And do you feel comfortable with REFUsol that you now have the products that you want going forward?

Garry W. Rogerson

Analyst

Yes, I -- thanks for that question. Firstly, we've now got a really good foundation. The foundation we described of manufacturing in Shenzhen, our localized R&D and distributed sales is really in place. So that has allowed us to now move forward to get -- to accelerate the revenue growth. So if you remember, we were talking about a good foundation, generation of cash, which of course, we're doing, and accelerating revenues into the future. So that's the basis of where we are. On the REFU acquisition, I mean, it's just beautiful for us. And if you think about the products we bought and the distribution we bought, they really dovetail into where we are today. So we're strong in utility in the high-end commercial, they're in lower-end commercials moving up. So we fit well there. Geographically, they're strong in Europe, which is, of course, a weak area and we recognize that. But they've also got a foothold in some very nice growth areas, including Eastern Europe, Mediterranean countries and probably more important for us is India. India is so important for us. We talked about it a year ago and said that we really want to make inroads into that country. We do now have revenues in India. And we have manufacturing, or the potential for manufacturing in India. And we have the potential for R&D or we have R&D in India. So we're in a nice position to get a good foothold in the Indian marketplace. So to answer your question -- and Gordon can fill in the holes for me. But product-wise, it's a great acquisition. Geographically, it expands us. We're still not worldwide. We've still got to find a way into Japan. Fortunately, we are developing products for Japan now, so we will get a foothold there. And we've got to find a way to work with our partner in China to see if we can get some revenues out of that country. But all in all, it's a super acquisition for us. Gordon, anything you'd like to fill in now?

Gordon B. Tredger

Analyst

No. We're very excited about the prospects for the 3-phase string products. It's a nice compliment to the central inverter portfolio that we have in the U.S. and we'll be able to leverage, as Garry said, the distribution into some of the other growing markets around the world, particularly Eastern Europe and India, as Garry suggested.

Garry W. Rogerson

Analyst

We think that -- I think we've said it now, we think will be in a position in 2014 to have roughly $400 million of revenues. But what I like about those revenues, firstly, they're profitable. They will be profitable revenues. But secondly, they were growth products into growth countries and growth applications, so we're positioned well. We've discounted the European revenues as we move forward. So we positioned ourselves for a really nice acceleration of growth from 2014. We think in 2014, we can get to roughly $100 million a quarter. And from there, we think we can grow.

Mark Delaney - Goldman Sachs Group Inc., Research Division

Analyst

That's helpful. For my follow-up question, it looks like your ASP per watt came down in the quarter. And I'm hoping you can elaborate if that's just changing your mix or if there's any increased competitive pressure.

Gordon B. Tredger

Analyst

No. I mean, we've always said you have to be a little bit careful looking at our revenues in terms of cents per watt because things do shift around between the utility segment and the commercial business on a quarterly basis. We aren't seeing anything unusual in terms of price pressure. We all know that over time, prices are going to come down. And that's why we've been so focused on getting our assembly and outsourcing activities out to Shenzhen so that we can remain profitable, even in a competitive circumstance.

Garry W. Rogerson

Analyst

Just a comment here again, and I'm not sure it gets across all the time. The model we have for manufacturing is so different to anyone else. I believe it's a very strong, competitive advantage. We are moving to Shenzhen, but we're outsourcing from Shenzhen. We are continually aiming for a fabless model. REFU doesn't have a manufacturing, so it fits in well with us. But our aim is not to manufacture, it's to keep pushing out from our Shenzhen facility. We've employed some really top-notch supply chain people, and it's working for us. So we've got to drive our costs down, we know that. We believe that we are in a great position to do that.

Operator

Operator

And your next question is from the line of Joe Maxa from Dougherty & Company. Joseph A. Maxa - Dougherty & Company LLC, Research Division: Danny, I just want to clarify on the $2 aspirational goal. Is that based on how it was originally defined or now on the pro forma numbers as you're pointing out?

Garry W. Rogerson

Analyst

As originally defined, we haven't changed anything. We're still talking about a GAAP aspirational goal. The reason we went to the pro forma was so that you can get a better feel to how we're going to get to that GAAP number or the pro forma we've described. But the GAAP goal is our aspirational goal. And the reality is we are putting the things in place to get there. If you look about our cash goals, our revenue goals and our earnings goals, you can see we've started -- we've done very well on cash. We're positioned well on revenues. And now we've got to get our -- continue to get our cost structure in order to sort out the earnings per share. And I think we have a reasonable track record of getting cost out the system, which we will continue. Danny, I'm sorry to...

Danny C. Herron

Analyst

Well, no, the only thing I would add is, Joe, to Garry's point, that the goal hasn't changed at all. It's still GAAP-based. And if you look, our current restructuring plan is expected to be complete by the end of this year, so you have a good apples-and-apples for 2014 that we've been focused on for the last 1.5 years. Joseph A. Maxa - Dougherty & Company LLC, Research Division: Right. I did want to ask, you have a big sequential pickup in Q2. And obviously, the new acquisition is part of that. Can you give us a rough breakout of where you expect your solar versus your Thin Films business to be for the quarter?

Garry W. Rogerson

Analyst

What we've said is that Thin Films business is moving forward. It's getting a little bit stronger. And our solar business, we've added the REFU product line. And I think you can read in the literature, people have broken out numbers for REFU. It's very difficult for us to do that because there are often puts and takes. There are some areas where we -- our product will be substituted for the 3-phase string and vice versa. So we just need to be a little bit careful there. But again, I think by next year, 2014, with that $400 million or $100 million a quarter, is a good number to be thinking around. Going back, I think Gordon mentioned, we're seeing a pickup in commercial activity -- order activity at the present time. And also in the utility, there are some large projects coming along that we're competing for and we usually get our share of those. So we have some good reasons to be optimistic in our solar business. Joseph A. Maxa - Dougherty & Company LLC, Research Division: Okay. And then last for me, once we get through this Q2 restructuring, which is going to be the larger piece of the restructuring, where should we -- how should we think about your OpEx in the second half of the year? What would be a good number to look at?

Danny C. Herron

Analyst

Joe, as we exit the year, OpEx will probably be down in the $35 million, $36 million per quarter range as we exit 2013. But as we said, the restructuring this quarter, while the number is large, remember the majority of that number is a noncash charge for intangible amortization. There's only about $3 million of cash charges. We will have some additional charges in Q3 and 4. But as I said earlier, we expect to be totally complete by the end of this year with the restructuring program and benefiting from $18 million to $20 million of additional cost savings that we've identified.

Operator

Operator

And your next question is from the line of Krish Sankar.

Krish Sankar - BofA Merrill Lynch, Research Division

Analyst

I have a couple of them. Number one, you guys said that there was some pushout of commercial orders in for Q1 for Solar Energy. Is it coming back in the Q2? And how much was that in terms of -- can you quantify that?

Garry W. Rogerson

Analyst

I think we said there was a pushout of revenue, Gordon will correct me if I'm wrong, in Q1. The order activity actually was quite strong. The pushout obviously was a seasonality type of pushout. But there were also some people who were having some difficulty getting their financials in the time that they said they were going to get them.

Gordon B. Tredger

Analyst

Krish, first of all, the orders weren't lost, they were just pushed out late in the quarter. And it's just a result of some permitting and financing activity that we're seeing taking a little longer than maybe this time last year. It's not something we're concerned about. It's just some -- for the longer term, the commercial market is very strong or looking very strong. And we think that's going to continue into the rest of the year.

Garry W. Rogerson

Analyst

And it's an ideal time to have our 3-phase string.

Krish Sankar - BofA Merrill Lynch, Research Division

Analyst

So is that pushout from Q1 actually getting redirect into Q2?

Gordon B. Tredger

Analyst

Yes.

Krish Sankar - BofA Merrill Lynch, Research Division

Analyst

Got it. And then I know it's very tough to break out REFU in your model. But if you try to do that, is the core underlying inverter business still growing in Q2?

Gordon B. Tredger

Analyst

Yes. I mean, again, as Garry said, going forward, we're looking at all of our product lines. But the underlying prospects in the commercial business are very strong. And as Garry commented, we've got some larger utility projects that are looking favorable at this point in time. So we think the prospects are very strong, particularly in the second half of the year for this business. And the REFUsol acquisition is going to add the 3-phase string products that should ensure that we've got a very strong platform going into next year.

Krish Sankar - BofA Merrill Lynch, Research Division

Analyst

Got it. And then on the REFUsol side, I know you guys -- it's primarily low-end commercial. Do you guys run into any residential guys? Have you guys run into any of the micro inverter folks?

Gordon B. Tredger

Analyst

We haven't run into -- so first of all, we are not competing in the residential market. We do solar products, particularly these new 3-phase string products, through distribution. But we are focused on the commercial side of the business with the 3-phase string products. And I want to make sure we don't underestimate the potential impact of this product line because I've seen prospects for the 3-phase string in the U.S. in 30- to 40-megawatt, as high as 30, 40 megawatts in terms of project sizes. So that would be a very substantial project.

Krish Sankar - BofA Merrill Lynch, Research Division

Analyst

Got it. And then just a final question. You guys had a pretty nice bounce up in the flat-panel business in Q1. Do you expect the momentum to continue through the rest of the year?

Yuval Wasserman

Analyst

Right now, what I can tell you is that is we expect the momentum to continue through the second quarter of this year, driven mainly by the expansion in Korea in the Annex 2 [ph] and Annex 3 [ph], and also a significant investment in touch panel industry across practically all of Asia, Japan, Taiwan, China, Korea, where we see benefit to us coming through both etches that go to polysilicon etch and power supplies for metallization for PVD that go to flat-panel -- to the touch screen and RF power supplies that go to passivation and intrareflective coating that goes to touch screens. So with the first half is very strong, driven by the expansion of GEN 5.5. The question is when the industry will go to the next level of investment? That will happen potentially the second half of this year and continue into 2014.

Operator

Operator

And your next question is from the line of Edwin Mok of Needham & Company. Edwin Mok - Needham & Company, LLC, Research Division: So a follow-up question to Krish's question on Thin Film. How do you think about how the operating margin for that business as we move forward? It sounds like you expect revenue to continue to go up. Do you expect the operating margin get back to kind of the 20% range that you guys achieved previously?

Yuval Wasserman

Analyst

Edwin, we continue to drive efficiencies in the business. And we, right now, benefit significantly by efficiency gains as we increase our volume for the factory. We will continue to drive efficiencies. And some of that was the change in the business model in Taiwan and Japan and some of that also in the way we operate the operation in Shenzhen. We expect to see some strength in the second half coming from glass investment in China and industrial segment of the business. And as this business continue to evolve, we will continue to see a fairly strong level of operating margins as we continue to work on efficiencies.

Garry W. Rogerson

Analyst

Edwin, we should get much better margins now because the costs have come down. So when we hit the peaks, we would have better margins than we had before. And you're already seeing that. You're already seeing that with a breakeven, it's much lower in the Thin Films business and we're getting the profitability at lower levels of revenue. If you wanted to model this thing, the, say, $75 million, $80 million per quarter number, and you've modeled the $400 million revenues number, you can get the sort of answer that we are aiming to get. Our aspirational -- we will get our aspirational goal. We shouldn't say will, but we should get our aspirational goal if we can hit $80 million of revenue in our Thin Film business, $400 million of revenue in our solar business. That has been -- $100 million a quarter, sorry. That has been our aim from day 1. That's what the thing that we're clinging to for our aspirational goals. And at the moment, we seem to have the pieces of the jigsaw to get there. So now we just have to put those pieces together. Edwin Mok - Needham & Company, LLC, Research Division: Great. That was actually very helpful. On the cost savings that you guys expect to realize, can you give us kind of roughly how much of that is expected to come out of OpEx versus how much of that is gross margin improvement that you expect?

Garry W. Rogerson

Analyst

Well, firstly, remember that REFU, we actually outsource our manufacturing from our solar -- 3-phase string is outsourced anyway. But we -- so a significant amount of the cost is going to come out of the operations. And I -- a lot of headcount will drop and a lot of buildings will be consolidated. And that is happening as we speak. It happened not on day 1, but probably day 7 and is continuing to happen. We want to have all the pain over with this quarter. We hope to have some of the buildings exited this quarter. That isn't a guarantee, but we are hoping to get them done. We'll certainly get them done in the next 6 months. So the painful issues relating to people and restructuring the organization should be done this quarter and the buildings we should have exited by the end of this quarter or sometime in the next quarter. And then it's just going to be a small amounts of costs from then on. Now there is a cost associated, of course, with the closure of our Bend manufacturing and transferring over into Fort Collins. So now we only have one place to test -- assemble and test in the U.S.. And that will probably be 6 months as well. Edwin Mok - Needham & Company, LLC, Research Division: I see. Okay. Actually, okay, that's great. That's helpful. And then third question I have is just on -- I guess, Danny, if you can help us a little bit on the model, right? If I get your guidance correctly, I think that your gross margin will go to kind of low 30s in the second quarter because you have incremental OpEx coming from REFUsol acquisition. And as you execute this restructuring plan, you expect your OpEx to kind of trend back down to the $36 million, $37 million range. Did I get that correctly?

Danny C. Herron

Analyst

You did.

Operator

Operator

And your next question is from the line of Weston Twigg of Pacific Crest Securities.

Weston Twigg - Pacific Crest Securities, Inc., Research Division

Analyst

Just a couple of quick questions. I was wondering if, first, maybe you could elaborate on this idea of a fabless model. And what I'm wondering is in a lot of cases, the fabless model can actually cost more to produce parts as you have to pay for the outsourcing. So can you elaborate a little bit more on how over the long run that saves money versus having your own factory?

Garry W. Rogerson

Analyst

Yes. I've never seen outsourcing cost more than manufacturing our own product. So if you look at it from the usage of cash, I've not seen that. But the beauty of our outsourcing model is we can go anywhere for our parts and subassembly. So we are not limited. We are very, very flexible. If I had a big manufacturing place, let's say, a village in Germany that I was trying to support, that is a hell of a fixed cost in a market that has some kind of a cycle. So I wouldn't want that. I think it's a big, big advantage in the type of industries we're in. I have to be very careful and talk about the industries that we're in, which do have some kind of cycle, that the outsourcing model is, by far, the best model for us. Now it may be that others can do -- work in a different way. But I love this model. We generate cash, we have low inventory and we will have, at the end of the day, higher margins because we're way more flexible.

Danny C. Herron

Analyst

Yes. Wes, I think if you cost a model based on some of the trade working capital that's tied up in it. So you take the semi cap industry, they turn their inventories 3 or 4x a year, and you now take that inventory in turn it into payable, it's a tremendous cash-generating model to have it outsourced. And then you don't have the troughs that you have, unutilized overhead and fixed cost. So it's really a lot more efficient model from a cash flow standpoint.

Garry W. Rogerson

Analyst

I think if you think about it as well and think of the components of our box, there's really not much in there. I mean, it's PCBAs, cables, cabinets. I mean, there really isn't that much there. And there's no way we're going to manufacture a PCBA. There's no way we're going to manufacture cables. And there's no way we're going to manufacture cabinets. And there's always someone out there who can do a better job than us in this area because of their volume.

Gordon B. Tredger

Analyst

So coming back to the term fabless models, first of all, the business we acquired with REFUsol is already a fabless business model. Their parent -- former parent company is a supplier to the automotive industry. They've got just a relentless focus on cost reduction. So we see that as an extremely positive element of the REFUsol acquisition. And then as we begin to apply that model to the solar side of the former AE business, we've got this wonderful spot in Shenzhen, where we have an existing presence through the Thin Films side of our business. We've augmented that with some very strong supply chain management resources, and we're seeing some excellent reductions in cost as we move things out of our U.S. factories, through Shenzhen, out to suppliers in Asia.

Danny C. Herron

Analyst

And the margins from our acquisitions have not been dilutive. I mean, even with the outsourced model, the margins are strong.

Weston Twigg - Pacific Crest Securities, Inc., Research Division

Analyst

Okay. Well, that's helpful. I guess, just a follow-on to that idea. If you're doing everything or trying to move to more of a fabless model, which you have been for some time, on the component side, it sounds like there's really not necessarily a lot of technology or complexity that goes into manufacturing. So does your competitive advantage really on the inverter side then just lie on business relationship...

Garry W. Rogerson

Analyst

Well, we've got a lot of technology and a lot of science. And that's the beauty of us. Now if you go back to our model, we have localized R&D in different areas of the world, optimizing products for that marketplace. It doesn't really matter where we manufacture. If you think about our inverters, they're actually very, very efficient inverters. The REFUsol inverter or the new AE 3-phase string is the most efficient 3-phase string inverter out there. There's a lot of super technology in that, that no one else has. And it acts the same for our inverters as well. So we -- no, you can outsource and have wonderful products with wonderful technology. And if you go to the shops, you can see that all the time.

Weston Twigg - Pacific Crest Securities, Inc., Research Division

Analyst

Good. Okay. And then just finally, can you just give us your thoughts on the Power-One acquisition and maybe how that changes the competitive landscape in your opinion?

Garry W. Rogerson

Analyst

I think it's great. I think it's absolutely great. It's a validation of everything we've said. And I'm very happy. As long as we keep nimble, as long as we're nimble, we'll win. I enjoy a big company buying a small company because it's validated what we've done. And now it's going to accentuate the difference between us and nimbleness and efficiency of an ABB. It's going to be a very interesting competition. But the really nice thing is the validation of the inverter. That's the really nice thing to make, excited by it.

Operator

Operator

[Operator Instructions] And your next question comes from the line of Mehdi Hosseini from SIG.

Mehdi Hosseini - Susquehanna Financial Group, LLLP, Research Division

Analyst

A couple of follow-ups. Garry, I think back 18 months or so ago when you first started with cost-cutting, the primary -- the goal number one was to streamline inverter manufacturing, moving in prior to manufacturing to Shenzhen. And we still haven't seen any meaningful leverage. Am I missing something? Or part of your strategy has had with acquisition that you recently did and we should see some leverage coming in the back half of this year? And I have a follow-up.

Garry W. Rogerson

Analyst

I think if we hadn't done what we've done, we would not be in the position we are today. I note that there are inverter companies out there that are not making money. I recognize it's a struggle for companies, but we are, I think, ahead of our competitors. Remember also that we charge our corporate costs to the inverter. We don't have corporate costs. So we are in not bad position. It's not good. I'm not saying it's good. We've got lots to do. But I think we've got the model to get there. And I think now with REFU, it gives us a little bit more critical mass to continue that vicious cost reductions that we need. Now I also think it's needed in any business, not just the solar business. This is where I differ from a lot of you out there. I think it benefits our Thin Films business and any business. So I'm very pleased with what we're doing actually. If you tell me -- ask me, well, are we -- what am I worried about? My worry is we're not fast enough. But you hear that all the time. We've got to continue our relentless move to reduce our costs, but at the same time, have great technology, great efficient products for our customers. That's what we...

Mehdi Hosseini - Susquehanna Financial Group, LLLP, Research Division

Analyst

Got it. And then the follow-up. I have two. So if I'm not mistaken, in your prepared remark, you said that you may also resize the Thin Film business. What prompted you to do that? And then the last question, given the acquisitions and all of these additional cost-cutting, are we still tracking the $2 GAAP earnings? Or are you actually thinking of maybe even an upside to that target?

Garry W. Rogerson

Analyst

Well, just on your first question related to Thin Film, which I thought I'd answered before. Our reduction in costs is a never-ending process. I can't imagine in any company where it ends because we're always working on ways to get more efficient. We have taken this opportunity with the acquisition of REFU, where we have more offices, more locations to actually shrink ourselves down. And Yuval's organization is taking that opportunity as well. To give you some feel to this, we'll probably have less square footage after the REFU acquisition than before the acquisition. So that's how aggressive we are. So we're taking on these revenues, but we're going to have less square footage after the acquisition. So we will always take out cost. It will be a nonstop process. The reason we've broken it out this time again is because it's so large. And that will probably happen. If we do another reasonably sized acquisition like this, we will find ways to reduce cost again. And there's no doubts about it.

Danny C. Herron

Analyst

And Mehdi, we are still on track for our $2 target. That is a GAAP target that hasn't changed. To the math that Garry suggested several minutes ago, if you model out our Thin Film business, so the $75 million, $80 million run rate, you take our solar business at $100 million run rate per quarter and hitting their 10% goal, you'll get us above our aspirational goal at this point. And as Garry mentioned, we continue to look for acquisitions as we go forward. Our focus is growing this company every day.

Garry W. Rogerson

Analyst

And remember if you look at those numbers, what we talked about was cash generation, accelerated profitable revenue growth and earnings per share. Well, cash generation, we're not doing too bad on. Revenue growth, we're starting to get going. And now we've got to keep downsizing the organization's cost structure to get the earnings per share. So I think we're actually in good shape for our aspirational GAAP goal. It is aspirational. We do need a little bit of wind behind us in Thin Film. So we've got to get to that $80 million of revenues, $75 million, $80 million. But we put -- we've got all the pieces of the jigsaw now. If I was you, I would ask the question, "Well, what else can help us get there?" I think in the Thin Film business, we've got to continue to reduce our costs but expand our applications. So our future use of money will probably be on expanding applications within Thin Film. They may be smaller acquisitions relating to solar. But in the main, we'll now start wanting to expand our Thin Film business.

Operator

Operator

There are no further questions. So I would like to turn the call over to Garry Rogerson for closing remarks. Please go ahead.

Garry W. Rogerson

Analyst

Thank you very much. I think we've said a lot today. An exciting time for us because all the pieces of LEGO are in place for us to try to get to our aspirational goals. We've got work to do, and I look forward to continue to report with you on these matters. Thank you, and goodbye.

Operator

Operator

Thank you for your participation in today's conference. This concludes the presentation. You may now disconnect. Have a good time. Thank you.