Analog Devices, Inc. (NASDAQ:ADI) Q3 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

Stacy Rasgon: Okay. And then that would drop off into Q2, though, you go the other way in Q2. So Q2 under like normal circumstances would be worse than seasonal because you have that extra week drop off?

Michael Lucarelli: Yes. So again, you can parse it in normal times, 2Q is up, call it, 2% to 5% and a 13-week to 13-week quarter, if you take away an extra week, yes, you have a 7.5% headwind. They have got 1Q.

Stacy Rasgon: Got it. Okay. That’s helpful. I have another one, but I guess I don’t want to get that band next time, so I….

Michael Lucarelli: I’ll allow another question because that’s a good clarifying question, Stacy.

Stacy Rasgon: Okay. I just wanted to ask about OpEx into next year. So it sounds like you’re guiding it to about $700 million in the Q4. How do I think about it next year into a revenue year that’s likely to be down potentially reasonably materially. Like how should we think about OpEx just year-over-year for fiscal ’24 versus ’23?

Prashanth Mahendra-Rajah: Yes. I think, Stacy, as we’ve always said, we run this business for the long term. So we’re going to make the adjustments that are prudent to make on the discretionary side, adjusting the variable comp and where we can, but the value of this company comes from its innovation. So I wouldn’t expect meaningfully more attack on the spending into 2024. But remember that our variable comp is designed to be highly accordion. So if ’24 plays out as a down year, you will see that meaningfully unwind for us. Anything else…

Stacy Rasgon: Is that $700 million runway Mike, is that like the right run rate to think about?

Michael Lucarelli: That’s not a crazy level to think about for the year. I think if you take a step back and look at kind of what we’re trying to manage within our control. We talked about gross margin maintaining at 70% a trailing 12-month basis. So for the full year, I think we can do 70% gross margins, and our goal is to maintain our operating margins within our long-term target and the low end of that account 42% to 45%. So that’s kind of some guardrails we think about as you’re modeling out next year and what would be a down year for revenue.

Stacy Rasgon: Got it. Thank you, guys.

Michael Lucarelli: Thanks Stacy.

Prashanth Mahendra-Rajah: Thank you.

Operator: Thank you. Our next question comes from Chris Danely with Citi. Your line is open.

Chris Danely: Hi. Thanks guys. Congrats Prashanth on retirement. I wish I was joining you. I just had a question on the Auto end market. So you’re saying that you expect it to do, I guess, better relatively than Industrial. Given how much inventory has been built there, and the upcoming UAW strike, do you think it’s possible that Auto could get materially worse? Are you baking that into any kind of forecast? And then are you I guess, Auto supply chain customers talking about a potential strike and the impact on their inventory.

Prashanth Mahendra-Rajah: Yes. All right. So thank you for the question. Chris, I think we’re going to see you in a couple of weeks in New York. So on Auto, I guess some context first, we’ve grown for 12 consecutive quarters year-over-year. And including the fourth quarter, we’re going to be up again. We said in the prepared comments that the lead times and the confidence supply is driving some of that acceleration in inventory adjustments and that’s happening across all our markets. When we look specifically at Auto in the quarter and our growth rates there, the same strong growers, BMS, GMSL, A2B. They grew in the third quarter and both on a sequential basis and year-over-year. We expect kind of the similar strength from them into the fourth quarter.