Stephen Newberry
Analyst · Barclays Capital
Thank you, Ernie, and thank you all for joining our call today. As many of you are aware, we held our Analyst and Investor Event at SEMICON West a few weeks ago, and I would like to take a few moments to reiterate the key messages we outlined during that meeting prior to providing our view of near-term market conditions and business outlook. We remain encouraged by the opportunities in the wafer fab equipment industry over the next couple of years, which is supported by a couple of things we discussed during SEMICON West. Those themes include trends in the mobile and computing space, where content-rich devices, such as smartphones, tablets and notebook PCs continue to drive demand for IC units. We expect that IC units will grow by 10% to 11% annually over the next 3 years to roughly 275 billion units by 2014. This bodes well for equipment suppliers as this strong IC unit growth will drive the need for additional wafer-processing equipment. The highly competitive mobile market is driving semiconductor device manufacturers to continue down the path of MOSFET to produce logic and memory chips capable of meeting the power, performance and form-factor requirements of these mobile products. The scale and challenges presented by these demands are significant and will require new and highly complex device architectures starting around the mid-to low 1x node in Memory and 20-nanometer or 14-nanometer node in Advanced Logic. As device complexities increase with each subsequent technology node, capital intensity is rising. As a result, IC manufacturers will need even more highly differentiated technology and productivity solutions, and Lam is well positioned to deliver on both of those requirements. These industry trends form the basis for our view of an annual WFE spend environment of approximately $30 billion plus or minus 10% over the next few years and the potential to reach the $40 billion level within the next 5 years as the new architectures move into high-volume production. During this cycle, our customers have demonstrated the ability to keep supply and demand in reasonable balance. Behavior, which is very different from prior industry cycles where device manufacturers, in pursuit of market share gains, created an oversupply situation by adding capacity well in excess of demand. This change reflects the consolidated customer base and the fact that some customers have reduced ability to raise needed capital. In addition, given the relatively short lead times for most equipment, customers have the ability to better time their deliveries to match the expected demand environment. As a result, even with overall healthy wafer fab spend levels, we expect a quarterly shipment variations in the range of plus or minus 25% will be experienced. Evidence of that environment is occurring now in terms of our expectations for the second half of this year. Since our April earnings call, Foundry players have adjusted their 2011 spending plans in response to reduce demand for 65-nanometer and above capacity, which has resulted in lower utilization rates. With the cost to add capacity at the 32-, 28-nanometer node in the range of 1 billion per 10,000 new wafer starts per month, the leading edge Foundry players are telling us that they plan to delay their earlier-stated 32-, 28-nanometer ramp plans, while they address yield ramping issues that are fairly typical with any transition to a new major technology node. As a result of these changes, we now project Foundry and IDM Advanced Logic spend within a range of $10 billion to $13 billion for the year and where we end up will ultimately depend on demand and the pace with which yield improvement related activities can be completed. Memory players are being very cautious with spending on DRAM capacity, reduced due to concerns over consumer PC demand, while NAND capacity and conversion investment continues on track for the calendar year as forecasted. Taking all of this into account, our view of 2011 wafer fab equipment spending is now in the range of $29 billion to $32 billion or flat to up 10% relative to 2010. At this point in time, if deliveries are executed as customers are requesting, we would expect closer to $29 billion unless Foundry and Advanced Logic companies decide to spend on the 32/28-nanometer node before the end of the calendar year. If you exclude the microprocessor portion of that spend, a segment in which Lam does not materially participate, our resulting served available market would be flat to down by approximately 10% for calendar year 2011. We believe that first half 2011, wafer fab equipment spending on an annualized basis was approximately $32 billion for the industry. And therefore, we expect second half 2011 shipments may be flat to down by as much as 19%. Longer term, Lam is well positioned to deliver strong financial results and continued market share gains in both Etch and Clean as a function of both sustained, healthy wafer fab equipment spending and the investments we are making today extending our competitive advantage at the leading-edge. Our strategy remains focused on providing differentiated technology and productivity solutions for our customers, extending our leadership position in etch, leveraging our customer trust, innovative technology and operational expertise in the single-wafer Clean and continuing to deliver solid financial performance. Moving on now to our September quarter guidance. As was discussed by many, in the Industry Trade Show at SEMICON West, customer push-outs have been occurring for the past few weeks. And for us, as recently as only 2 days ago. Therefore, we are guiding to September shipments of $580 million plus or minus $25 million, revenues of $670 million plus or minus $20 million, gross margin at 42% plus or minus 1%, operating profit at 14% plus or minus 1% and earnings per share of $0.63 plus or minus $0.07 a share. While the current quarterly wafer fab equipment spending environment is certainly challenging for us in the near term, we remain committed to making the investments necessary to support our long-term strategies. Our strong balance sheet and cash-generation capability provide the company with financial strength and flexibility. As we close another solid quarter for the company, I would like to take the opportunity to thank our employees for their dedication and contribution towards Lam's continued success. They are the best in our industry. With that, Ernie and I will take your questions.