Kulicke and Soffa Industries, Inc. (NASDAQ:KLIC) Q1 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

Lester Wong: Yes. So I think Fusen already mentioned with the COVID pivot right, it does affect our Q2 and may affect a little bit in the Q3, right? However, the COVID pivot also may drive much stronger, I guess a quick recovery, but that probably more in Q4, so if I think to give some color, I would say that probably Q3 would be weaker than Q4. So in terms of what the consensus is, I don’t think they’ll be equal. I think Q3 will be maybe a little weaker than was thought before but Q4 will be stronger.

Craig Ellis: Great, thanks so much guys.

Operator: Thank you. Next question is coming from Charles Shi from Needham and Company. Your line is now live.

Charles Shi: Hey, thank you for taking my question. I have a few, I’ll be mindful of my airtime in case your answer takes longer. So really the — going back to the question about your full-year outlook Q3, you said, it’s a little bit weaker than you expected a quarter ago, but Q4 may be stronger, but that does still imply a quite a very strong uptick in Q4. I’m thinking if you’re sticking to let’s say $850 million for the full-year, let’s say the June quarter maybe you’re getting $200 million. But you have to make a $300 million quarterly revenue in Q4. Are you comfortable with that, kind of, trajectory into the second half of the year? That’s my first question. Thank you.

Fusen Chen: So Charles, I think it’s really stronger to have a math calculation with you. So let’s do this, I think $175 million for the first quarter, the second quarter $170 million, that would be $370 million, $345 million right, so $345 million. So it’s I see — we talked about FOT not FET, right. FOT right, so if FOT I think we’re talking about $460 million right. So $460 million if we take even is $230 million so even, it’s $200 million in Q3, we are talking about $260 million last year, right? I wish all my calculation is right. I don’t have accurate one.

Lester Wong: So Charles. We believe that it’s achievable in the second half, right. I mean it may slip a little bit either way, right. There’s a push and pull right. But we think, we do see a path there particularly with the backlog as well as the increased order coming in. So we didn’t say it will be $200 million in Q3, right. I just said it would be a little bit softer. But again, it is a little bit volatile out there, but we do feel comfortable with $840 million in terms of, for the year.

Charles Shi: Yes, yes. So let me ask the same question from a different angle. I think four years ago around the same time that was right at the beginning of 2019 downturn, you also expressed, sort of, like optimism about fiscal second half being higher than fiscal first half, but the actual result was actually your fiscal second half was lower in 2019 than your fiscal first half? I mean by many metrics so we look at 2023 downturn it’s probably worse, not better than 2019 downturn. My question, maybe from a high level, what gives you the confidence that you’re going to do a lot better in this downturn half-over-half perspective than 2019. I know this is the same question, but hopefully we can get some color from a different angle. Thank you.