Advanced Semiconductor Engineering (ASE) and Siliconware Precision Industries (SPIL) both expect their third-quarter sales to register another sequential growth buoyed by rising demand for copper-wire bond packaging and advanced packaging processes.
ASE's ATM (assembly test and material) business is forecast to post a 4-6% on-quarter increase in shipments for the third quarter of 2012, with flat ASPs, the company said at a recent investors meeting. Gross margin for the quarter is set to remain unchanged at about 22.4%.
Sales of copper wire bonding and low pin count packaging will play a main contributor to the ATM division's shipment growth in the third quarter, according to ASE.
Sales of ASE's ATM unit rose 11% sequentially, which slightly came under the company's targeted 15% growth. However, gross margin for the quarter beat the company's guidance of 20.5-21.3% buoyed by lower raw materials costs and its ongoing transition from gold to copper wire bonding.
Rival SPIL also enjoyed a high utilization rate of its copper wire bonding capacity during the second quarter, when the firm saw its gross margin climb to 19.3%, the highest level in 10 quarters. SPIL also credited the positive result to a more-favorable product mix.
Acknowledging brisk demand coming from the consumer electronics and communications sectors during the third quarter, SPIL expects to generate sales growth of 2-5% sequentially in the quarter. Gross margin for the third quarter will grow further to 20-22% as a result of an improved cost structure.
SPIL indicated that its wire bonding production lines will continue to run at full capacity during the third quarter, while utilization rates of its flip-chip (FC) ball-grid array (BGA) packaging and logic IC testing capacity will reach 95% and 80%, respectively.
Looking forward, both ASE and SPIL hold a relatively optimistic outlook concerning their sales performance during the fourth quarter of 2012, when compared with recent predictions from foundries like TSMC.
Fourth-quarter sales at ASE's ATM business should outperform the prior quarter's levels, driven by strong demand for communications products, ASE said. Besides, with foundries set to ramp up capacity for their advanced processes around the end of the third quarter, ASE expects its output to rise and buoy sales performance in the fourth quarter.
However, ASE still needs one to two months to determine how much growth its fourth-quarter revenues will manage, as the overall supply chain has been cautious about inventory controls, the firm noted.
SPIL believes that semiconductor demand for smartphones, tablet PCs and notebooks with new CPU platforms is expected to spur around the end of 2012. There is still room for growth in the industry during the last quarter of the year.
In addition, both ASE and SPIL reiterated their planned capex budgets for 2012 remain unchanged. | 