艾克爾 (AMKR) 2008 Q1 法說會逐字稿

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  • Operator

  • Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen, and thank you for standing by.

  • Welcome to the Amkor Technology, Incorporated, first quarter earnings conference call.

  • During today's presentation, all parties will be in a listen-only mode.

  • Following the presentation, the conference call will be open for questions.

  • This conference call is being recorded today, Wednesday, April 30th, 2008 and will run for up to one hour.

  • Before we begin the call, Amkor would like to remind you that there will be forward-looking statements made during the course of this conference call.

  • These statements represent the current view of Amkor Management and actual results could vary materially from such statements.

  • Prior this conference call, Amkor's first quarter earnings release was filed with the SEC on Form 8-K.

  • The earnings release, together with Amkor's other SEC filings contain information on risk factors, uncertainties and assumptions that could cause actual results to differ materially from Amkor's current expectations.

  • I would now like to turn the call over to Mr.

  • James Kim, Chief Executive Officer and Chairman.

  • Please go ahead, sir.

  • James Kim - Chairmen & CEO

  • Thank you, and good afternoon.

  • This is James Kim.

  • With me today is Joanne Solomon, our Chief Financial Officer.

  • Today, we delivered Q1 results that were in line with historical seasonality, with both revenue and profitability exceeding our expectations for the quarter.

  • Relative to historical results, $699 million in sales is a record first quarter and a near peak revenue levels.

  • Our stable first quarter financial performance in the face of an uncertain economy demonstrates that our business model remains sound.

  • We continue to enrich our product niche and strengthen our relationship with leading customers worldwide through focused R&D efforts and aligning our capital deployment plans with our customers' technology road maps.

  • We are not immune to the macro conditions faced by the entire electronics industry.

  • At the same time, our customer demand has been solid in certain wireless and networking applications where Amkor is well positioned.

  • On the fourth quarter conference call, I said looking forward, our strategy's intact.

  • I would like to take this opportunity now to provide a broad overview of our plan.

  • First, we strive for technology leadership and innovation.

  • This focus drives both our product development efforts and our capital additions.

  • Second, we focus on building strategic alliance with our customers, as well as OEMs.

  • These ties are fundamental to our success.

  • Third, we have a diverse geographical footprint that provides world class manufacturing infrastructure, operational scale and scope, and the a competitive cost structure.

  • One of the keys to our success in pursuing this strategy is our continuing financial discipline in capital spending and managing our operations.

  • We are focused on building our product portfolio in support of our key customers and strive to improve asset productivity and returns.

  • By improving profitability and managing our costs, we can generate the cash necessary to fund the growth, technology development, and to reduce our debt.

  • These four cornerstones of our strategy, technology leadership, close customer relationships, efficient manufacturing infrastructure, and the financial discipline are evident in our strong results for the first quarter, our improved gross margins, sustained profitability, and solid cash flow over the past two and a half years.

  • We improved our cash position in the first quarter and continued to generate free cash flow and reduce debt, while investing in R&D and focused capital additions, such as wafer bumping capacity.

  • We are now better positioned than we have been in recent years from a liquidity and cash flow standpoint to respond to new growth opportunities and the cyclical nature of the semiconductor industry.

  • We anticipate second quarter sales to show modest growth in an environment of reduced consumer spending in the United States.

  • We expect the second quarter sales to grow 1 to 3% compared to the first quarter, which would, again, be a strong revenue quarter on an absolute dollar basis.

  • We have made significant progress over the last two years and are excited about our future.

  • Since December 2005, we have reduced our debt by $474 million and remain committed to further reductions of our debt over the next several years.

  • As concerns with our liquidity diminish, we are able to focus more on the prudent growth opportunities in areas where we have a competitive advantage and can obtain an appropriate return on our investment.

  • However, we remain mindful of our growth margins and do not intend to reverse the progress we have made to our profitability.

  • Joanne Solomon will now review our first quarter operating performance.

  • Joanne?

  • Joanne Solomon - CFO

  • Thank you, Jim.

  • We exceeded our sales and profitability targets in the first quarter of 2008, with stronger than expected demand for both our packaging and test services from some of our largest customers, primarily in support of wireless communications and networking applications.

  • Our gross margin was 20 basis points better than the high end of guidance.

  • EPS was $0.07 cents above the high end of guidance, primarily due to an approximately $0.05 benefit from foreign exchange gains.

  • The slight upside to our revenue and gross margin forecast was primarily driven by the strength of our advanced technologies.

  • First quarter net sales decreased 6.3% from the fourth quarter 2007, while unit shipments decreased 7.2%, reflecting a seasonal decline in demand.

  • While unit demand fluctuates from period to period, there has been an historic upward trend, which has driven our growth and that of the semiconductor industry.

  • More recently, we have grown our revenues at a faster pace than our units, demonstrating the benefit of our advanced package and test technology development, focused capital additions, and the resulting enrichment of our product mix.

  • Pricing was generally stable during the first quarter.

  • However, prices for packaging and tests generally decline over time.

  • We continue to experience some price reduction on select package types, as we share the benefits of our ongoing diamond engineering efforts with our customers.

  • Gross margin in the first quarter of 2008 was 25.2%, a decline from our record revenue fourth quarter, but an improvement over Q1 2007 gross margin of 22.6%.

  • The year-over-year improvement principally reflects higher capacity utilization, enriched product mix, and improved factory performance, while the sequential decline reflects lower unit volumes.

  • Net interest expense for the first quarter was $29 million, decreasing from $30 million in Q4 and $37 million in the first quarter of 2007.

  • Since the first quarter of 2006, we have reduced our quarterly interest expense by 33% through our ongoing debt reduction efforts and selective refinancing of high cost debt in prior periods.

  • During the first quarter, we retained $101 million in debt, including remaining $88 million of 9.25 senior notes that were retired in February.

  • We expect to pay an additional $53 million of maturing amortizing debt throughout 2008.

  • We have no significant debt maturing until 2011 other than about $56 million of term debt maturing annually.

  • Total debt at the end of the quarter was less than $1.7 billion and our net debt was less than $1.3 billion.

  • We had currency gains of approximately $9.5 million primarily as a result of the depreciation of the Korean wan at the end of the first quarter and the remeasurement of the Korean wan denominated severance obligation on our balance sheet.

  • The effective income tax rate for the quarter was 7.6%, and we anticipate an effective tax rate of approximately 8% for 2008.

  • We generated $92 million of free cash flow in the first quarter and about $95 million in capital additions.

  • Although we currently expect to be free cash flow positive for the second quarter of 2008, we expect free cash flow will significantly decrease, reflecting the higher levels of capital additions in the first half of 2008.

  • For all of 2008, we expect that our capital additions will be in the range of approximately 12 to 14% of net revenues.

  • Although our capital intensity level has increased somewhat in 2008 over the level of the last two years, it remains significantly below historic levels.

  • Here's a recap of our second quarter 2008 guidance contained in our earnings release.

  • Sales up 1 to 3% from the first quarter of 2008.

  • Gross margin, approximately 25%.

  • Net income in the range of $0.32 to $0.36 per diluted share.

  • The guidance includes an estimated $9.7 million gain from a real estate transaction that closed in April 2008.

  • Operator, we will now open this call for questions.

  • Operator

  • Thank you.

  • (OPERATOR INSTRUCTIONS).

  • Our first question comes from Bill Ong with American Technology Research.

  • Please go ahead.

  • Bill Ong - Analyst

  • Yes, congratulations on another solid quarter.

  • My question is for Mr.

  • Kim.

  • You've done a remarkable job in the last couple years improving profitability, but you also in your late 60s.

  • I just wanted to understand whether or not you have a succession plan in place because one hasn't been announced yet, because I want to understand the future leadership of Amkor.

  • James Kim - Chairmen & CEO

  • Well, Mr.

  • McCain is running as the president.

  • Yes, I do have, and we have discussed this at the Board full level.

  • We continue to discuss this subject and you will see some change in our organizational announcement coming.

  • Bill Ong - Analyst

  • Okay.

  • Joanne Solomon - CFO

  • I can assure you, Jim is very young for his age, and is clearly very energetic and very motivated and he's clearly puts me to shame on many fronts.

  • James Kim - Chairmen & CEO

  • Thank you.

  • Bill Ong - Analyst

  • Great.

  • That's good to hear.

  • My second question is just your planned CapEx for this year, is it still at $300 million, given you've already spent about 80% of the budget?

  • Joanne Solomon - CFO

  • We don't guide absolute numbers.

  • We've never guided that number.

  • What we guide to is capital intensity rates and what we're saying is that our capital intensity is 12 to 14%, whatever your estimates are for the year, I would take that as the 12 to 14% rate and that's your guidance for CapEx.

  • James Kim - Chairmen & CEO

  • Let me answer a little bit on that, add some color to you.

  • Last two years or so, you know company was going through improvement of balance sheet, so we are certainly concerned about liquidity of the company, level of the debt.

  • But that's why we contained our CapEx significantly, but now that we have resolved that issue, I think we have a much stronger balance sheet.

  • We are now going to this 12 to 14% as a guide because we are now giving a little more attention to growth area.

  • Bill Ong - Analyst

  • Okay, that's helpful.

  • Thanks.

  • And what kind of tax rate assumption for '09?

  • And that will be it.

  • Joanne Solomon - CFO

  • For '09, for 2008, we're at 8%.

  • We generally don't go out beyond '08, but I would, I would keep it at a consistent rate.

  • It should be increasing slightly as holidays expire.

  • Bill Ong - Analyst

  • Thank you very much.

  • Operator

  • Our next question comes from Timothy Arcuri with CitiGroup.

  • Please go ahead.

  • Timothy Arcuri - Analyst

  • Hi, couple things.

  • First of all, if you kind of look at what's going on at the chip level and you look at the inventory builds that we're actually seeing there, we're just beginning to see inventory building at the chip level.

  • And if you look back four or so cycles, that's always had a corresponding impact on your business.

  • I'm wondering, certainly mix helps you this time a lot and so I'm wondering, is there some way to quantify how much the mix might be helping you?

  • I guess, one question might be to look at what's happened to pricing in your core business, say, in the last six quarters, because you're shipping the same number of units now that you were six quarters ago and your revenue's almost the same.

  • So I'm wondering if the mix at the high end is offsetting the pricing declines at the low end.

  • So I'm just trying to figure out how much pricing has changed over, like, the last six quarters in your core business.

  • James Kim - Chairmen & CEO

  • Tim, I think you may be right.

  • Again, I haven't done any specific studies, but absolutely our product is becoming more complex.

  • In other words, more stats are happening, more wires, so obviously per unit basis, our value-added is increasing.

  • So obviously it shows you, units have not increased or somewhat decreased, but the revenue has increased.

  • It shows that product mix is the main reason.

  • But I haven't done any -- we haven't done any specific analysis of that at this time.

  • Joanne Solomon - CFO

  • We do take a look at some of it and clearly the lead frame packages, there are cents and there are lots and lots of packages where the more advanced packages are much higher ASPs and much fewer units.

  • So there is a disproportionate in the number -- the absolute number of units does distort basically the mix with what Jim says.

  • Timothy Arcuri - Analyst

  • Well, Jim, just as a follow-up to that, from your history, going back to what happened, say, in '04 and also in '06, when there was a chip inventory build, how did the sequence of events happen, where you kind of heard about a change in your business?

  • Was it that there were, you saw the inventory build and then there was wafer start cuts and then there was cuts at the subcons and so there was a lag of maybe a month or two or -- how did the sequence of events happen during the prior cycles?

  • James Kim - Chairmen & CEO

  • Well, again, it's a very good question, by the way.

  • But what I have noticed over the years is, it's really moderate changing.

  • Seasonality, I notice much more seasonality within the given year.

  • Now, for instance, last year, you know we said fourth quarter's going to be flat to slightly up.

  • Instead, it turned out to be 6, 7% higher.

  • The reason I think is we all human.

  • We learn from the mistakes or whatever happened the previous year and so on, so people have memory and I think lot of our customer and our customers, their customers are learning how to control inventory.

  • So that's what happened, I think, is right now.

  • You notice some increase in inventory, which is natural, remember.

  • Third quarter is where everybody builds inventory for the fourth quarter customer market.

  • Question is how big are they going to build inventory?

  • I already noticed from all our customers, they are very mindful of the level of inventory, so I really think it could happen again this year, but who knows.

  • I'm not here to predict Q3 or Q4 at all.

  • I really simply follow the market, and we have a very good six-month forecast kind of model from each customer they put in our computer, so we are very confident of this quarter, coming quarter.

  • And I'm sure, I'm certain Q2 will be higher because they are going to start building inventories.

  • But beyond that, I think it's very difficult to give any numbers.

  • Timothy Arcuri - Analyst

  • Okay, Jim.

  • Thanks.

  • Operator

  • Our next question comes from Chris Blansett with JPMorgan.

  • Please go ahead.

  • Christopher Blansett - Analyst

  • Couple quick ones here.

  • There's been a lot of talk before the call, I know, from the investors about material cost increases and whether or not you guys could pass this along to your customers or absorb some of these.

  • I wonder if you could make some comments on that?

  • James Kim - Chairmen & CEO

  • Well, I guess best way to look at that is our gross margin.

  • Obviously we're able to pass through some of the material increase happening in the market, and we have good models working.

  • It's working, and what you should notice last 4 1/2 years is steady, steady improvements of gross margin.

  • How small it is, but you see improvement coming.

  • Christopher Blansett - Analyst

  • I guess did you see any increased pressure on material pricing, or is it, what we've kind of seen for the past few quarters?

  • James Kim - Chairmen & CEO

  • Yes, we have seen some increase in substrait areas and so on, and gold prices are definitely going up.

  • But we have a ways to pass through some costs.

  • Christopher Blansett - Analyst

  • Okay, and then I think, Joanne, often you give the breakout of costs by material and labor and so on.

  • Have you provided that this time?

  • Joanne Solomon - CFO

  • Yes, I can certainly give that.

  • As a percentage of revenue --

  • Christopher Blansett - Analyst

  • Right.

  • Joanne Solomon - CFO

  • -- materials are about 38%, direct labor was about 16%, depreciation was about 8%, and the other costs were about 13%.

  • Christopher Blansett - Analyst

  • Okay, and one quick last one.

  • You talked about factory, I guess either efficiency or productivity improvements is helping to drive the gross margin upside versus last year.

  • How should we look at this going forward?

  • Are there still incremental improvements that can occur on a factory to factory basis that could help the margin throughout the year?

  • James Kim - Chairmen & CEO

  • Yes.

  • Again, I think -- I think we now have a good historical data in many ways.

  • If you look at the Q4, we achieved some record gross margins.

  • So that shows you when volume goes up, revenue goes up, there's a possibility we can improve margins.

  • But mindful of that is on the other hand, we are adding capacity, so question is, margin really depends on the balance.

  • Joanne Solomon - CFO

  • And the only other thing I would add is our factories work very hard to reduce costs each and every day.

  • These efforts can take many forms.

  • They take a look at redeploying assets.

  • They take a look at optimizing capacity available on the installed base, negotiate with vendors, substituting lower cost materials and select reductions in force.

  • They work tirelessly to take out the costs.

  • I wouldn't be in a position at this point to suggest that we would model further improvements for 2008, but it's something we focus on daily.

  • Christopher Blansett - Analyst

  • All right, thank you.

  • Operator

  • Our next question comes from Peter Kim with Deutsche Bank.

  • Please go ahead.

  • James Kim - Chairmen & CEO

  • Hi, thanks for taking my questions.

  • First I wanted to ask about your EPS guidance.

  • That includes the one-time real estate transaction, and if you strip that out, it's -- it hints at maybe your operating expenses are going to go up.

  • Considering the Tesera issue that should be getting resolved in the current quarter, do you expect OpEx to increase significantly?

  • Joanne Solomon - CFO

  • So we are, we are seeing some increases in operating expenses.

  • The guidance we gave for Q2 doesn't include anything with respect to Tesera other than the legal costs.

  • We are ongoing efforts to improve our IT infrastructure and couple that with the legal costs.

  • We are seeing an uptick.

  • We continue to invest heavily in R&D and we expect that to continue for 2008, so as a percentage of revenues, I could see R&D continuing to track at that level.

  • So we do -- we are seeing an uptick in the level of operating expenses.

  • James Kim - Chairmen & CEO

  • Okay, and with regards to the currency effects that are happening, and particularly on the NT dollars, I was wondering if you are seeing any kind of, maybe a competitive advantage as a result.

  • I'm trying to get an understanding about should this currency exchange rate maintain its current level, do you anticipate any upside in business or competitive gains?

  • Joanne Solomon - CFO

  • 80% of our revenues are all denominated in U.S.

  • dollars, so the appreciation of the Taiwanese dollar shouldn't impact any of that.

  • I don't see too much of a competitive advantage.

  • We all manage FX.

  • Some of it more of a translation, like you saw with us with the $9.5 million, that wasn't a real gain for us.

  • That's clearly noncash, so I think some of what our competitors may have seen is really a translation issue and not an economic one.

  • James Kim - Chairmen & CEO

  • Okay, thank you.

  • Operator

  • Our next question comes from C.J.

  • Muse with Lehman Brothers.

  • Please go ahead.

  • C.J. Muse - Analyst

  • Yes, good afternoon.

  • Thank you for taking my question.

  • I guess if I could follow on that last question on the OpEx side, looks like you're guiding at the midpoint up about $5 million.

  • And I guess the question here is how much of that is sort of one-time legal that we're going to see in Q2 and only Q2, and how much of that will sustain itself through the second half of the year?

  • Joanne Solomon - CFO

  • I think it is going to continue on.

  • While the legal expenses will diminish, we are ramping up our IT efforts to implement SAP here at corporate, which is a very involved process.

  • So we will have -- legal may diminish, but our consulting costs will likely increase to offset that.

  • C.J. Muse - Analyst

  • And I guess in '07, you ran about 10.7% OpEx.

  • Can you see that getting up to 12%?

  • I mean how should we think about that for the year?

  • Joanne Solomon - CFO

  • Separating our R&D from SG&A, I could see R&D staying at a 1.8, 2% of revenues.

  • I could see SG&A staying flattish to these levels.

  • C.J. Muse - Analyst

  • Okay, and then I guess second question, you talked about units down worse than revenue, so ASP is clearly up.

  • Was there any benefit in there from FX that we should be thinking about?

  • Joanne Solomon - CFO

  • Not much.

  • Like I said, the 80% of our revenues are all U.S.

  • dollar based.

  • There was a little benefit for the Taiwan dollar and there was a little benefit for the Japanese yen, but that was typically just offsetting what we had there for labor.

  • Great, thank you.

  • Operator

  • Our next question comes from Ryder Campbell with Barclays.

  • Please go ahead.

  • Ryder Campbell - Analyst

  • Hi, thanks.

  • It seemed like during the quarter, your cash conversion cycle improved considerably.

  • I wanted to see if there was something there that was more than just temporary or if you just see this as kind of a perhaps seasonal blip or something happening with maybe just your receivables or payable line item that we shouldn't expect going forward.

  • Joanne Solomon - CFO

  • Sometimes it's hard to factor and calculate our cash conversion off of the publicly available stuff.

  • The way we do the calculation, we have clear transparency to be able to break out our payables between how much is trade versus maybe payables for equipment as an example.

  • We didn't see any significant changes in the trends in our cash conversion.

  • We saw a slight improvement in DSOs, but other than that, it was very consistent with our operating model.

  • Ryder Campbell - Analyst

  • And then on the real estate proceeds that you have coming in that supposedly closed in April, can you give us a little more color on what those facilities are, where they are located, and if you have any other plans for any additional sales, kind of on the block for the near future?

  • Joanne Solomon - CFO

  • Sure, I absolutely can give that color.

  • It was in Korea.

  • It's a facility that we were using as a warehouse in connection with our drop shipment services.

  • We talked a little bit earlier on the call about the constant efforts of our factories to reduce costs.

  • They saw a way to reconfigure the existing factory space to pull that into other buildings and it was a real opportunity to contract the footprint slightly and then realize a gain.

  • Ryder Campbell - Analyst

  • Do you see any other opportunities similar to this?

  • Joanne Solomon - CFO

  • I wouldn't say there are too many of these.

  • This is -- it was, it was a great opportunity, and we took advantage of it, so I don't see much else coming up.

  • Ryder Campbell - Analyst

  • And just one last thing, on your revenue guidance of 1 to 3% sequentially for next quarter, can you give us a little bit of color on what unit growth and price change you have kind of built into that, or at least kind of directionally, i.e., do you expect units to continue to be weak versus price change or how should we look at that?

  • Joanne Solomon - CFO

  • I don't think we have really good data with respect to being able to forecast units.

  • I wouldn't expect -- I wouldn't begin to predict further enriching of the mix at this point.

  • James Kim - Chairmen & CEO

  • Very difficult to really project that.

  • You remember last year, we were Q1 to Q2 flat, and this is only a 1 to 3%.

  • We're not talking about 10% increase.

  • So obviously as I told you earlier about Q3, where normally the large inventories are built, I'm sure some of the customers may decide to build the inventory early.

  • That's why we may see small increase.

  • Ryder Campbell - Analyst

  • Just a point of clarification on the asset sale, again, what are the proceeds expected from that?

  • I noticed that it's just worded as a $9.7 million gain.

  • What are the expected proceeds?

  • Or I guess you've already received them.

  • Joanne Solomon - CFO

  • We already received them.

  • I don't have the exact number, but I think it was around $12 million to $15 million, somewhere in that range.

  • James Kim - Chairmen & CEO

  • About $12 million.

  • Joanne Solomon - CFO

  • We have a low cost basis on that.

  • Ryder Campbell - Analyst

  • Thanks.

  • Operator

  • Our next question comes from Eric Reubel with MTR securities.

  • Please go ahead.

  • Eric Reubel - Analyst

  • Hi, thanks for taking my questions.

  • Another really good quarter, guys.

  • Congratulations.

  • Mr.

  • Kim, could you talk a little bit about what your efforts are going to be focused on in China into 2008, sort of what products you're ramping within the factories and how -- what percentage possibly of revenue do you expect to generate from China?

  • James Kim - Chairmen & CEO

  • Currently China, as you know, our two sites are full and we have third site we are in process of expanding and there we are mostly concentrating on (inaudible), bumping and so on.

  • And actually China facility is really extension of our factory in Korea, K-4, which is the large factory, most efficient one.

  • And we are -- it's only a one-hour flight distance from Korea to Shanghai, so this is really model following and whenever there is an opportunity that customer wish to go there for, some capacity reasons or price reasons, we try to expand and that -- we still have a huge space available for expansion.

  • So this is our plan.

  • I don't think I can give you specifics, how fast we're going to grow in China itself.

  • Joanne Solomon - CFO

  • So just to continue to put it a little bit further in perspective --

  • Eric Reubel - Analyst

  • Sure.

  • Joanne Solomon - CFO

  • Korea and the Philippines still represent about 75% of our business, so China's very small for us right now.

  • While we have the ability to expand and we have intentions to expand, it's still small currently.

  • Eric Reubel - Analyst

  • So the sense is that the two initial buildings are full and that the building that was obtained from IBM could be, is still --

  • James Kim - Chairmen & CEO

  • That's the one we hope to expand.

  • By the time that gets filled up, China will become a significant presence, but it won't happen this year.

  • It will take a few more years of effort.

  • Eric Reubel - Analyst

  • Great.

  • And Joanne, on working capital, you did an excellent job this quarter.

  • Do you think working capital can be a source again in second quarter?

  • James Kim - Chairmen & CEO

  • We clearly focus on working capital and I -- we're going to have to begin to pay off some of this CapEx that we acquired in the first quarter, so let me just check a couple of things and I can give you a more direct answer.

  • So I would not expect it to be a source.

  • Eric Reubel - Analyst

  • Okay.

  • Thanks very much.

  • Operator

  • (OPERATOR INSTRUCTIONS).

  • Our next question comes from Eric Solomon with Morningstar.

  • Please go ahead.

  • Joanne Solomon - CFO

  • Hi, congratulations on a good quarter.

  • Thanks for taking my call.

  • I just wonder, you've done a terrific job in repaying debt so far, but if the economy was to head into a slowdown, kind of what would your ideal capital structure be?

  • James Kim - Chairmen & CEO

  • Regardless of what the economic condition, I really -- I think I stated it once, I can repeat again, probably -- we want to be net debt position of about $500 million or $700 million.

  • That would be ideal.

  • When we can achieve, of course I cannot give this forward-looking statement, but we are in the right direction.

  • Even if there is a slowdown, as I stated, U.S.

  • economy is definitely somewhat very slow, but worldwide, we have now product -- our services are worldwide basis, not just U.S.

  • alone.

  • So I am still expecting, as long as all the GDP growth above 3% or near 4% area, I believe we're going to continue to see growth coming.

  • That's my observation of our business.

  • Joanne Solomon - CFO

  • Thanks very much.

  • Very helpful.

  • And my follow-up, I just wanted to ask you about the Taiwan semis recent statements that they were interested in getting more involved in the packaging side and whether or not you see this as a --

  • James Kim - Chairmen & CEO

  • Well, I read that, too, and we are in touch with them.

  • TMC is a very, very important company in our space.

  • They are like any other IBM -- we deal with many customers who have their own capacity, but we deal with them.

  • They are something that we cannot compete against them, but we also have a lot of things to offer them, so I'm not too concerned about that itself.

  • Joanne Solomon - CFO

  • Thanks very much.

  • Congratulations, again.

  • James Kim - Chairmen & CEO

  • Thank you.

  • Operator

  • Our next question comes from Mike Lanier with AIG.

  • Please go ahead.

  • Mike Lanier - Analyst

  • Well, he stole my TSMC question, so I did read some stories in the press that testing looks like it's going to be a little weak here in the second quarter.

  • Can you talk about your testing side of your business?

  • James Kim - Chairmen & CEO

  • We don't see that frankly.

  • In fact, anything testing is getting stronger in our business.

  • Mike Lanier - Analyst

  • And this story on TSMC, you imagine if they do actually make a move into the package and test that the other fabs will copy them?

  • James Kim - Chairmen & CEO

  • I really cannot tell you.

  • Frankly, I really don't know exactly what TSM's specific plans are.

  • You know, packaging is a very broad service.

  • I'm sure they are talking some specific areas, such as wafer level area or something, but again, we have some advantages.

  • They have their own advantage.

  • Therefore, we have to find what -- where we belong.

  • Again, they are a very formidable company, they are one of the largest in the world in terms of foundry.

  • We have to respect that and we have to understand where they are going, but they are a very important customer to us.

  • So we're going to be face to face.

  • Next week we have, in fact, a meeting, so we'll learn more about it as time goes by.

  • Mike Lanier - Analyst

  • Okay.

  • Thank you.

  • Operator

  • Our next question comes from Gus Richard with Piper Jaffray.

  • Please go ahead.

  • Gus Richard - Analyst

  • Yes, thanks for taking my question.

  • Can you talk a little bit about demand for wafer bump, flip chip, and sort of what trend you're seeing in bump pitch and the impact on your gross margins.

  • James Kim - Chairmen & CEO

  • I don't think I can answer that question.

  • I'm sorry.

  • I can give you --

  • Joanne Solomon - CFO

  • I can comment about flip chip and bumping demand.

  • It clearly remains very strong.

  • The -- while flip chip and bump was down in the first quarter, it wasn't down in line with seasonal expectations, so we still saw strength in that area.

  • Going beyond into the second quarter, we are seeing growth in the flip chip and bumping areas.

  • It's clearly a direction that we're heading, and as inventories are built in support of consumer products in the third quarter, it should continue to be very, very strong performer for us.

  • James Kim - Chairmen & CEO

  • In terms of demand I agree, I thought you were asking --

  • Joanne Solomon - CFO

  • -- second half of the question --

  • James Kim - Chairmen & CEO

  • I could not answer that.

  • But again, demand wise, I tell you, that's where our competitors are investing heavily, because that's where the growth is coming at the moment.

  • Gus Richard - Analyst

  • Okay, and then just to try to clarify, are you seeing demand for tighter bump pitches?

  • Is that a trend that you continue to see?

  • Joanne Solomon - CFO

  • I can follow up on that and be more prepared on that question for the next call.

  • Gus Richard - Analyst

  • Okay, thank you.

  • Operator

  • (OPERATOR INSTRUCTIONS).

  • Our next question is a follow-up from Timothy Arcuri.

  • Please go ahead.

  • Timothy Arcuri - Analyst

  • Hi, Jim.

  • That point you were making about inventory build and that being why you think revenue should grow in both Q2 and Q3, is there some sign out there or some argument that this time, because of weak demand, you're actually pulling forward inventory build a little bit, so what normally would have been seasonal build in Q3 is actually happening in Q1 and Q2 because of weak demand.

  • So have you seen any signs from your customers who maybe still give you kind of an okay forecast but that they are getting increasingly worried about demand not about supply?

  • James Kim - Chairmen & CEO

  • Frankly, it's the other way.

  • That's all I can tell you.

  • But I don't -- whatever is beyond this quarter's forecast, I don't think I can really give you anything.

  • But truthfully it is definitely much higher, but how much do you trust the number?

  • At this time, I cannot give any hint to that.

  • But it's not like the way you describe, by the way.

  • It's the other way.

  • Timothy Arcuri - Analyst

  • It is?

  • Okay.

  • Thanks, Jim.

  • Operator

  • Our next question is a follow-up from Christopher Blansett.

  • Please go ahead.

  • Christopher Blansett - Analyst

  • Yes, I had a question.

  • Did you guys provide any utilization rate data for the quarter?

  • Joanne Solomon - CFO

  • We did.

  • It's on the data sheet.

  • It's 80%.

  • Christopher Blansett - Analyst

  • And then as we look forward, should -- based on the knowledge or the information you have in front of you, we should expect some increase in utilizations as we head into the seasonally strong time of the year?

  • Joanne Solomon - CFO

  • Absolutely.

  • Christopher Blansett - Analyst

  • Okay, that's it.

  • Thank you.

  • Operator

  • Our next question is a follow-up from Eric ruble.

  • Please go ahead.

  • Eric Reubel - Analyst

  • Joanne, quick kind of housekeeping question on the balance sheet.

  • If I account for the debt maturity and the amortization on the term loan, did you repurchase any other debt in the quarter?

  • Just trying to work back to the balance sheet number, it seems to be a little -- my number seems to be a little higher than what today's release shows.

  • Joanne Solomon - CFO

  • No, we didn't repurchase any, but we did pay other term debt in the subsidiary, so depending if you back that out as well, maybe that's why you and I are a little bit different.

  • Christopher Blansett - Analyst

  • Is that about $30 million?

  • Joanne Solomon - CFO

  • Yes.

  • Christopher Blansett - Analyst

  • Okay, great.

  • Thanks.

  • Operator

  • And at this time, I am showing no additional questions in the queue.

  • I would like to turn the call back over to Management for any concluding remarks they may have.

  • James Kim - Chairmen & CEO

  • Well, thank you for participating in our conference call.

  • We look forward to speaking with you again.

  • Thank you.

  • Operator

  • Ladies and gentlemen, this does conclude the Amkor Technology, Inc.

  • first quarter earnings conference call.

  • ACT would like to thank you for your participation.

  • You may now disconnect.