Mary Puma
Analyst · Needham
Thank you, . With me today is Kevin Brewer, Executive Vice President and CFO; and Doug Lawson, Executive Vice President of Corporate Marketing and Strategy. We are all participating in this call remotely, so I would like to apologize in advance for any technical difficulties. If you have not seen a copy of our press release issued yesterday, it is available on our website. Playback service will also be available on our website as described in our press release. Please note that comments made today about our expectations for future revenues, profits and other results are forward-looking statements under the SEC safe harbor provision. These forward-looking statements are based on management's current expectations and are subject to the risks inherent in our business. These risks are described in detail in our Form 10-K annual report and other SEC filings, which we urge you to review. Our actual results may differ materially from our current expectations, we do not assume any obligation to update these forward-looking statements. Good morning, and thank you for joining us for our fourth quarter and year-end 2022 earnings call. As a result of strong execution by the Axcelis team and robust demand for the Purion product family, we are pleased to announce record quarterly and annual revenues. Revenue for the fourth quarter was $266.1 million, with earnings per share of $1.71. Revenue for the full year 2022 was $920 million with record annual earnings per share of $5.46. As a result of a record backlog of over $1.1 billion, continued solid bookings and strong customer demand in the power device market, we expect both revenue and earnings to grow in 2023. For the first quarter of 2023, we expect revenue of approximately $240 million, gross margin of roughly 41.5% and operating profit of around $48 million and earnings per share of approximately $1.25. For the full year 2023, Axcelis revenues are expected to exceed $1 billion. This represents revenue growth of over 8% in a year in which overall wafer fab equipment is expected to decrease by over 20%. Additionally, we are introducing a new long-term implant-only model with revenue of $1.3 billion that we believe is achievable within the next 2 to 3 years. The mature process technology market continues to be an area of strength for Axcelis, with 76% of fourth quarter system shipments going to mature foundry logic customers, 4% to advanced logic customers and the customers comprised of 15% DRAM and 5% NAND. For the full year 2022, 82% of system shipments went to mature foundry logic customers, 1% to advanced logic customers and 17% to memory customers comprised of 8% DRAM and 9% NAND. The geographic mix of our system shipments is becoming more globally distributed. In the fourth quarter, China represented 35%; Korea, 29%; the U.S. 19%; Europe, 8%; Taiwan, 6%; and the rest of the world, 3%. For the full year 2022, China was 41%, Korea, 20%; the U.S., 15%; Europe, 9%; Taiwan, 6%; Japan, 2% and the rest of the world, 7%. The power device market is anticipated to be Axcelis' demand driver through this industry downturn due to the rapid growth rate of the market and the high implant intensity of power devices. We expect over 55% of our system revenue in 2023 to come from this segment with greater than 50% of the overall power device system revenue coming from silicon carbide applications. Silicon carbide provides many performance advantages over silicon for electric vehicle applications and is expected to grow significantly over the next several years. Currently, we estimate that silicon carbide wafer starts will double every 3 years, driven by a 30% annual growth rate in this device market, which is dominated by automotive. Purion power series products for silicon carbide have been designed to support the technical challenges facing our customers as they ramp to high volume in support of their automotive customers. Axcelis is the only ion implant company that can deliver complete recipe coverage for all power device applications. The full Purion power series family of products allows customers to optimize their fabs for high-volume manufacturing and to continuously improve their power device performance. The Purion H200 and Purion EXE family, in particular, provide high levels of productivity and lower cost of ownership to our customers as their recipe mixes shift to high dose and high energy implants. Since 2021, we have seen increasing adoption of Purion H200 silicon carbide and Purion XE silicon carbide systems in addition to our Purion M silicon carbide tool. In 2023, we expect revenue from silicon carbide customers to be spread relatively evenly across these 3 types of Purion power series implanters. This complete product offering provides a significant competitive advantage for Axcelis in this market. The power device customer base is large and growing, and we are actively engaged with all customers in this high-growth market segment. Axcelis is considered by power device customers to be the technology leader and the supplier of choice, providing the best product family and manufacturing capabilities. This means that using Axcelis tools provides the lowest risk path to high-volume manufacturing required to support aggressive fab ramp plans. Axcelis placed a significant value on enabling our customers to succeed in this exciting market by providing differentiated product performance and a high level of customer satisfaction. Now I'd like to turn it over to Kevin to discuss our financials and operational capabilities and to introduce our new $1.3 billion model.