威騰電子 (WDC) 2022 Q2 法說會逐字稿

Good afternoon and thank you for standing by. Welcome to Western Digital's Fiscal Second Quarter 2022 Conference Call. (Operator Instructions) As a reminder, this call is being recorded.

下午好，感謝您的支持。歡迎參加西部數據 2022 財年第二季度電話會議。 （操作員說明）作為提醒，此通話正在錄音中。

Now we'll turn the call over to Mr. Peter Andrew. You may begin.

現在我們將把電話轉給彼得安德魯先生。你可以開始了。

Thank you and good afternoon, everyone. Joining me today are David Goeckeler, Chief Executive Officer; and Bob Eulau, Chief Financial Officer.

謝謝大家，大家下午好。今天加入我的是首席執行官 David Goeckeler；和首席財務官 Bob Eulau。

Before we begin, let me remind everyone that today's discussion contains forward-looking statements, including product portfolio expectations, business plans and performance, trends and financial outlook based on management's current assumptions and expectations, and as such, does include risks and uncertainties. We assume no obligation to update these statements. Please refer to our most recent financial report on Form 10-K filed with the SEC for more information on the risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially.

在開始之前，讓我提醒大家，今天的討論包含前瞻性陳述，包括基於管理層當前假設和預期的產品組合預期、業務計劃和業績、趨勢和財務前景，因此確實包含風險和不確定性。我們不承擔更新這些聲明的義務。請參閱我們最近提交給 SEC 的 10-K 表格財務報告，以了解有關可能導致實際結果出現重大差異的風險和不確定性的更多信息。

We will also make references to non-GAAP financial measures today. Reconciliations between the non-GAAP and comparable GAAP financial measures are included in the press release and other materials that are being posted in the Investor Relations section of our website.

今天，我們還將參考非公認會計準則財務指標。非 GAAP 和可比 GAAP 財務措施之間的對賬包含在新聞稿和我們網站投資者關係部分發布的其他材料中。

With that, I will now turn the call over to David for introductory remarks.

有了這個，我現在將把電話轉給大衛做介紹性發言。

Thank you, Peter. Good afternoon, everyone, and thanks for joining the call to discuss our second quarter of fiscal 2022 results.

謝謝你，彼得。大家下午好，感謝您加入討論我們 2022 財年第二季度業績的電話會議。

We delivered strong results for the fiscal second quarter with revenue of $4.8 billion and non-GAAP gross margin of 33.6%, both of which are within the guidance range we provided last quarter. Additionally, we reported non-GAAP earnings per share of $2.30, which was ahead of our expectations. I'm proud of the team as this marks the seventh consecutive quarter of meeting or exceeding guidance amid a continuously increasingly challenged supply chain.

我們在第二財季取得了強勁的業績，收入為 48 億美元，非美國通用會計準則毛利率為 33.6%，兩者都在我們上季度提供的指導範圍內。此外，我們報告的非公認會計原則每股收益為 2.30 美元，超出了我們的預期。我為這個團隊感到自豪，因為這標誌著在供應鏈不斷受到挑戰的情況下連續第七個季度達到或超過指導水平。

Before I go over the detailed results and business trends, I want to offer some important key takeaways coming out of calendar year 2021. First, we have made significant progress in strengthening our product portfolio. We delivered on our goals of qualifying our enterprise SSD products at three cloud titans and two OEMs, commercializing energy-assisted hard drives as well as commencing shipments of 20-terabyte hard drives based on OptiNAND technologies. These products address the large and fast-growing opportunities within the cloud for storage.

在詳細介紹結果和業務趨勢之前，我想提供一些 2021 日曆年的重要要點。首先，我們在加強產品組合方面取得了重大進展。我們實現了我們的目標，即在三個雲巨頭和兩個 OEM 中驗證我們的企業 SSD 產品，將能量輔助硬盤商業化，並開始出貨基於 OptiNAND 技術的 20 TB 硬盤。這些產品解決了雲存儲中巨大且快速增長的機會。

Second, demand for Western Digital storage solutions across cloud, client and consumer end markets remains consistently strong. We are optimistic about our outlook for calendar year 2022 as our customers continue to indicate solid demand across the end markets we serve. I'll share more about that demand and other macro factors later.

其次，雲、客戶端和消費者終端市場對西部數據存儲解決方案的需求持續強勁。我們對 2022 日曆年的前景持樂觀態度，因為我們的客戶繼續表示我們服務的終端市場的需求強勁。稍後我將分享更多關於這種需求和其他宏觀因素的信息。

Third, we are continuing to navigate an increasingly complex supply chain, which is impacting both our customers' ability to ship products as well as our ability to build products. In order to meet our end customers' demand, we are incurring additional costs that will weigh primarily on our hard drive gross margins through the first half of calendar year 2022. These issues are transitory in nature, affecting both revenue and gross margin, and we expect them to subside as the supply chain normalizes. We remain confident that the long-term growth and profitability opportunity in front of us has not changed.

第三，我們將繼續駕馭日益複雜的供應鏈，這既影響了我們客戶的產品運輸能力，也影響了我們製造產品的能力。為了滿足最終客戶的需求，我們正在產生額外的成本，這將主要影響我們到 2022 年上半年的硬盤毛利率。這些問題本質上是暫時的，影響收入和毛利率，我們隨著供應鏈的正常化，預計它們會消退。我們仍然相信，擺在我們面前的長期增長和盈利機會並沒有改變。

Lastly, we received an investment-grade corporate rating from Fitch in December, which represents Western Digital's second investment-grade corporate rating. This marks an important milestone as we have worked hard over the last 18 months to strengthen our financial position, providing us with greater financial flexibility in the future. As we approach our targeted debt levels, we look forward to reengaging in a capital return program in fiscal year 2023.

最後，我們在 12 月獲得了惠譽的投資級企業評級，這是西部數據的第二個投資級企業評級。這是一個重要的里程碑，因為我們在過去 18 個月裡一直在努力加強我們的財務狀況，為我們在未來提供更大的財務靈活性。隨著我們接近目標債務水平，我們期待在 2023 財年重新參與資本回報計劃。

Turning to our results. This past quarter, demand remained strong across our end markets, and our customers and the Western Digital teams continue to work diligently to mitigate the impact of supply chain disruptions. In particular, cloud revenue for the fiscal second quarter increased by 89% from the same period last year. We continue to anticipate strength in storage demand, which is bolstered by our ability to continue to bring innovative new products to market to meet the needs of the digital economy.

轉向我們的結果。上個季度，我們終端市場的需求依然強勁，我們的客戶和西部數據團隊繼續努力減輕供應鏈中斷的影響。特別是第二財季的雲收入同比增長了89%。我們繼續預計存儲需求的強勁勢頭，這得益於我們繼續將創新的新產品推向市場以滿足數字經濟需求的能力。

The potential of what can be accomplished through the creation of content and the ability to access digital information easily has never been greater. With our technology, we are enabling businesses, creators and innovators to think bigger and push their limits even further.

通過創建內容和輕鬆訪問數字信息的能力可以實現的潛力從未如此巨大。借助我們的技術，我們使企業、創造者和創新者能夠思考更大的問題，並進一步推動他們的極限。

Western Digital has built a great position in the large and growing storage markets. Our proven ability to innovate and develop a balanced portfolio, coupled with our broad routes to market, puts Western Digital in a strong position to capitalize on the many growth opportunities ahead of us.

西部數據在龐大且不斷增長的存儲市場中建立了良好的地位。我們經過驗證的創新和開發平衡產品組合的能力，加上我們廣泛的市場途徑，使西部數據處於有利地位，可以利用我們面前的許多增長機會。

I'll now recap our HDD and Flash businesses. In HDD, overall cloud end-market product demand remained high with revenue increasing 50% year-over-year led by capacity enterprise hard drives. Although we were up strongly year-over-year, capacity enterprise hard drives declined sequentially after 2 quarters of strong shipments, partly due to some of our customers' supply chain challenges. As both Western Digital and our customers continue to face supply chain challenges, we will experience some near-term visibility issues. However, our overall demand signals continue to be very good as we move through the calendar year, and we will be in a stronger position once these headwinds subside.

我現在將回顧一下我們的 HDD 和 Flash 業務。在硬盤方面，整體雲終端市場產品需求仍然很高，在容量企業硬盤的帶動下，收入同比增長 50%。儘管我們的同比增長強勁，但容量企業硬盤在連續兩個季度的強勁出貨量之後環比下降，部分原因是我們的一些客戶的供應鏈挑戰。隨著西部數據和我們的客戶繼續面臨供應鏈挑戰，我們將遇到一些近期可見性問題。然而，隨著我們度過整個日曆年，我們的整體需求信號繼續非常好，一旦這些不利因素消退，我們將處於更有利的位置。

During the fiscal second quarter, we commenced volume shipments of our 20-terabyte CMR hard drives based on OptiNAND technologies. We are very excited about OptiNAND, a revolutionary technology that utilizes flash in the control plane to further increase areal density. Additionally, we are seeing an increase in customer interest in adopting SMR technology and expect multiple cloud titans to deploy SMR drives in high volume later in this calendar year.

在第二財季，我們開始批量出貨基於 OptiNAND 技術的 20 TB CMR 硬盤。我們對 OptiNAND 感到非常興奮，這是一項革命性的技術，它利用控制平面中的閃存來進一步提高面密度。此外，我們看到客戶對採用 SMR 技術的興趣在增加，並預計多個雲巨頭將在本日曆年晚些時候大量部署 SMR 驅動器。

In Flash, revenue grew in the second fiscal quarter due to seasonal strength in mobile and consumer. Within mobile, shipments of our BiCS5 products into leading 5G smartphones increased over 60% sequentially and 50% year-over-year, led by strong content growth. BiCS5 shipments represented over 40% of total revenue, and BiCS5 production crossover took place during the quarter as expected. The successful ramp of BiCS5 helped accelerate our overall year-over-year bit shipment growth to 37% in the quarter.

在 Flash 中，由於移動和消費者的季節性強勁，第二財季的收入有所增長。在移動領域，我們的 BiCS5 產品在領先的 5G 智能手機中的出貨量環比增長超過 60%，同比增長 50%，這得益於強勁的內容增長。 BiCS5 出貨量佔總收入的 40% 以上，BiCS5 生產交叉如預期在本季度發生。 BiCS5 的成功升級幫助我們在本季度加速了我們的整體比特出貨量同比增長至 37%。

Our WD_BLACK premium SSD product line optimized for the best gaming experience continues to gain momentum, with revenue increasing about 50% sequentially and doubling in calendar year 2021. Along with flash products for gaming consoles, revenue has grown from 0 to over 10% of our flash portfolio over the last 2 years. As consumers demand more ways to access, generate and store content, whether via gaming or the now emerging metaverse, our strong and growing flash portfolio will be integral to enable all of these applications.

我們為最佳遊戲體驗而優化的 WD_BLACK 優質 SSD 產品線繼續保持增長勢頭，收入環比增長約 50%，並在 2021 日曆年翻了一番。連同用於遊戲機的閃存產品，收入已從我們的 0% 增長到超過 10%過去 2 年的閃存投資組合。隨著消費者需要更多方式來訪問、生成和存儲內容，無論是通過遊戲還是現在新興的虛擬世界，我們強大且不斷增長的閃存產品組合將成為支持所有這些應用程序不可或缺的一部分。

In line with the guidance we provided last quarter, our client SSD business declined sequentially due to supply chain disruptions at some of our PC customers and pricing pressure in the more transactional markets. So far, within the current quarter, we are starting to see pricing in the more transactional markets stabilize. As I mentioned earlier, our enterprise SSD products are qualified at three cloud titans and 2 major storage OEMs, marking significant progress compared to one cloud titan a year ago. As you know, this has been one of my top priorities.

根據我們上個季度提供的指導，由於我們的一些 PC 客戶的供應鏈中斷以及更多交易市場的定價壓力，我們的客戶 SSD 業務環比下降。到目前為止，在本季度內，我們開始看到更多交易市場的定價趨於穩定。正如我之前提到的，我們的企業級 SSD 產品通過了三個雲巨頭和兩個主要存儲 OEM 的認證，與一年前的一個雲巨頭相比，有了顯著的進步。如你所知，這一直是我的首要任務之一。

Building upon the early success of ramping BiCS5 into mobile and gaming consoles, we are further strengthening our product portfolio as we move through calendar year 2022. In client SSD, the bedrock of Western Digital's flash portfolio, we have launched and are ramping BiCS5-based products in the fiscal third quarter, with BiCS5 enterprise SSD products later in the year.

在將 BiCS5 推廣到移動和遊戲控制台的早期成功的基礎上，隨著我們進入 2022 日曆年，我們將進一步加強我們的產品組合。在客戶端 SSD 中，西部數據閃存產品組合的基石，我們已經推出並正在推廣基於 BiCS5產品在第三財季推出，BiCS5 企業級 SSD 產品將在今年晚些時候推出。

For our next-generation 3D flash, we began initial commercial shipment of consumer flash devices based on our 162-layer BiCS6. Furthermore, we qualified and commenced revenue shipment of client SSDs based on QLC and BiCS5 technology in the fiscal second quarter. While still early in its evolution, we are starting to pave the way for the industry's adoption of QLC in the future, and our next-generation BiCS6 node will play an important role in that evolution.

對於我們的下一代 3D 閃存，我們開始了基於 162 層 BiCS6 的消費類閃存設備的初步商業出貨。此外，我們在第二財季獲得了基於 QLC 和 BiCS5 技術的客戶端 SSD 的資格並開始收入出貨。雖然仍處於發展初期，但我們已開始為行業在未來採用 QLC 鋪平道路，而我們的下一代 BiCS6 節點將在這一發展中發揮重要作用。

Let me now offer a few observations on the demand environment. The accelerated digital transformation in the last 2 years has created a world that is more technology-enabled and technology-dependent than ever before. We anticipate these trends will continue to drive data storage growth across each end market we serve: cloud, client and consumer. Our customers remain optimistic about demand trends in calendar 2022, driven by capital investment for the cloud build-out, continued recovery in enterprise spending, growth in smart video applications, increased adoption in 5G phones, consumer gaming and emerging trends such as VR/AR devices.

現在讓我對需求環境進行一些觀察。過去 2 年加速的數字化轉型創造了一個比以往任何時候都更加技術支持和技術依賴的世界。我們預計這些趨勢將繼續推動我們服務的每個終端市場的數據存儲增長：雲、客戶端和消費者。在雲建設的資本投資、企業支出的持續復甦、智能視頻應用的增長、5G 手機的採用率增加、消費者遊戲以及 VR/AR 等新興趨勢的推動下，我們的客戶仍然對 2022 年的需求趨勢保持樂觀設備。

In cloud, our customers have announced a 36% year-over-year increase in capital investment for the cloud build-out. This, coupled with an increase in enterprise spending and continued growth in smart video applications, is expected to drive growth for our flash and HDD products into this growing end market.

在雲方面，我們的客戶已宣布用於雲構建的資本投資同比增長 36%。再加上企業支出的增加和智能視頻應用的持續增長，預計將推動我們的閃存和 HDD 產品進入這個不斷增長的終端市場。

In client, PC end demand has remained strong. Our customers are driving more consistent demand than the past several quarters, and we see continued stabilization in 2022. PC unit shipment forecasts continue to be robust and significantly ahead of pre-pandemic levels. In addition, we anticipate an eventual return to site to drive a mix shift towards commercial PCs, which tend to offer richer client SSD content versus consumer-oriented PCs.

客戶端方面，PC端需求依然強勁。與過去幾個季度相比，我們的客戶推動的需求更加穩定，我們預計 2022 年將繼續穩定。PC 出貨量預測繼續強勁，並大大高於大流行前的水平。此外，我們預計最終將返回站點以推動向商用 PC 的混合轉變，與面向消費者的 PC 相比，商用 PC 傾向於提供更豐富的客戶端 SSD 內容。

In mobile, the latest 5G phones have doubled NAND content from prior-generation smartphones. We expect mobile device content to benefit as ongoing 5G adoption and new 5G-enabled applications are expected to drive the storage demand in both endpoints in the cloud.

在移動領域，最新的 5G 手機的 NAND 容量是上一代智能手機的兩倍。我們預計移動設備內容將受益，因為持續的 5G 採用和支持 5G 的新應用預計將推動雲中兩個端點的存儲需求。

In Consumer, the highlight of this end market is our WD_BLACK SSD line of products optimized for gaming enthusiasts. Revenue more than doubled in calendar year 2021. The consumer recognition of the strength and value of WD_BLACK, along with the SanDisk and SanDisk Professional brands, drove a 34% year-over-year growth in average capacity per unit in consumer flash.

在消費者領域，這個終端市場的亮點是我們為遊戲愛好者優化的 WD_BLACK SSD 系列產品。收入在 2021 日曆年翻了一番以上。消費者對 WD_BLACK 以及 SanDisk 和 SanDisk Professional 品牌的實力和價值的認可，推動了消費閃存的每單位平均容量同比增長 34%。

While end customer demand in calendar 2022 looks promising, supply chain challenges are increasing. This both limits our ability to source components to meet customer demand and increases component costs. These costs are on top of the ongoing elevated logistics and health and safety COVID costs. While we believe these incremental costs are transitory and will subside as the supply chain conditions normalize, they will impact our results through the first half of this calendar year.

雖然 2022 年的最終客戶需求看起來很有希望，但供應鏈挑戰正在增加。這既限制了我們採購組件以滿足客戶需求的能力，又增加了組件成本。這些成本是在持續升高的物流以及健康和安全 COVID 成本之上的。雖然我們認為這些增量成本是暫時的，並且會隨著供應鏈狀況的正常化而消退，但它們將影響我們在本日曆年上半年的業績。

Let me now turn the call over to Bob, who will discuss our fiscal second quarter results and provide a more detailed outlook for calendar year 2022. Bob?

現在讓我把電話轉給 Bob，他將討論我們的第二財季業績，並提供更詳細的 2022 日曆年展望。Bob？

Thanks, Dave, and good afternoon, everyone. As Dave mentioned, overall results for the fiscal second quarter were better than our expectations, marking the seventh consecutive quarter that we've met or exceeded guidance.

謝謝，戴夫，大家下午好。正如戴夫所提到的，第二財季的總體業績好於我們的預期，標誌著我們連續第七個季度達到或超過了預期。

Total revenue for the quarter was $4.8 billion, down 4% sequentially and up 23% year-over-year. Non-GAAP earnings per share was $2.30, which exceeded the high end of our guidance range. Please note that this figure includes $70 million in total COVID-related costs, which was higher than we anticipated entering the quarter. I'll provide more details on these costs in a minute, but we are pleased to have delivered such strong results in the face of ongoing supply chain issues and COVID-related challenges.

本季度總收入為 48 億美元，環比下降 4%，同比增長 23%。非 GAAP 每股收益為 2.30 美元，超出了我們指導範圍的高端。請注意，這個數字包括 7000 萬美元的與 COVID 相關的總成本，高於我們進入本季度的預期。我將在一分鐘內提供有關這些成本的更多詳細信息，但面對持續的供應鏈問題和與 COVID 相關的挑戰，我們很高興能夠取得如此強勁的成果。

In addition to this solid financial performance, we hit a major milestone this quarter in receiving an investment-grade corporate rating from Fitch. This marks the company's second investment-grade corporate rating. We are pleased to see that our work to build a stronger financial foundation is being recognized and is providing us with greater financial flexibility for the future.

除了穩健的財務表現外，我們在本季度達到了一個重要的里程碑，獲得了惠譽的投資級公司評級。這標誌著該公司的第二個投資級公司評級。我們很高興看到我們為建立更強大的財務基礎所做的工作得到了認可，並為我們未來提供了更大的財務靈活性。

Additionally, we closed a public debt offering last December and amended our loan agreement with lenders in January, bringing the maturity of over 85% of our debt balance to 2026 and beyond. For more details, please refer to our earnings presentation.

此外，我們在去年 12 月完成了公開發行債券，並在 1 月修訂了與貸方的貸款協議，使我們超過 85% 的債務餘額到期至 2026 年及以後。更多詳情，請參閱我們的收益報告。

Turning to our end markets. Cloud represented 40% of total revenue at $1.9 billion, down 14% sequentially and up 89% from a year ago. Supply chain disruptions impacted cloud hard drive deployments at certain customers, which led to a sequential decline in exabyte shipments in the fiscal second quarter. However, healthy overall demand for capacity enterprise drives, along with Western Digital's leadership position at the 18-terabyte capacity point, drove a greater than 50% year-over-year increase in exabyte shipments.

轉向我們的終端市場。雲計算佔總收入的 40%，為 19 億美元，環比下降 14%，比一年前增長 89%。供應鏈中斷影響了某些客戶的雲硬盤部署，導致第二財季艾字節出貨量連續下降。然而，對容量企業級硬盤的健康總體需求，以及西部數據在 18 TB 容量點的領先地位，推動了 EB 出貨量同比增長超過 50%。

The client end market represented 38% of total revenue at $1.9 billion, flat sequentially and down 1% year-over-year. The continued ramp of 5G phones helped offset decline in both client SSD and client hard drive revenue, enabling total client revenue to stay flat. Client hard drives represent less than 15% of our HDD revenue.

客戶端市場佔總收入的 38%，為 19 億美元，環比持平，同比下降 1%。 5G 手機的持續增長幫助抵消了客戶端 SSD 和客戶端硬盤收入的下降，使客戶總收入保持不變。客戶端硬盤驅動器占我們硬盤驅動器收入的不到 15%。

Lastly, consumer represented 22% of revenue at $1.1 billion, up 9% sequentially and flat year-over-year. With a strong holiday season, retail flash led the sequential growth in consumer. On a year-over-year basis, growth in consumer flash was offset by a decline in consumer HDD.

最後，消費者佔收入的 22%，達到 11 億美元，環比增長 9%，同比持平。由於假期旺季，零售快閃帶動了消費者的連續增長。與去年同期相比，消費級閃存的增長被消費級 HDD 的下降所抵消。

Turning now to revenue by segment. We reported flash revenue of $2.6 billion, up 5% sequentially and up 29% year-over-year. On a blended basis, flash ASPs were down 6% sequentially due to a seasonal increase in shipments to mobile and retail. On a like-for-like basis, flash ASPs were down 3% sequentially. Flash bit shipments increased by 13% sequentially and 37% year-over-year.

現在轉向按部門劃分的收入。我們報告的閃存收入為 26 億美元，環比增長 5%，同比增長 29%。在混合基礎上，由於移動和零售出貨量的季節性增長，閃存平均售價環比下降 6%。在類似的基礎上，閃存平均售價環比下降 3%。閃存位出貨量環比增長 13%，同比增長 37%。

Hard drive revenue was $2.2 billion, down 14% sequentially and up 16% year-over-year. On a sequential basis, total hard drive exabyte shipments decreased by 14%, while the average price per hard drive decreased by 5% to $97. On a year-over-year basis, total hard drive exabyte shipments increased by 27%.

硬盤收入為 22 億美元，環比下降 14%，同比增長 16%。在連續的基礎上，硬盤驅動器 EB 總出貨量下降了 14%，而每個硬盤驅動器的平均價格下降了 5% 至 97 美元。與去年同期相比，硬盤驅動器 EB 總出貨量增長了 27%。

As we move to costs and expenses, please note that my comments will be related to non-GAAP results unless stated otherwise. Gross margin for the second quarter was 33.6%, down 0.3 percentage points sequentially. As noted earlier, the COVID-related impact was $10 million higher than we anticipated at $70 million.

當我們轉向成本和費用時，請注意，除非另有說明，否則我的評論將與非公認會計原則的結果有關。第二季度毛利率為33.6%，環比下降0.3個百分點。如前所述，與 COVID 相關的影響比我們預期的 7000 萬美元高出 1000 萬美元。

Our flash gross margin was 36.1%, down 0.9 percentage points sequentially. This included COVID-related impact of $10 million or approximately 0.4 percentage points. Our hard drive gross margin was 30.6%, down 0.3 percentage points sequentially. This included COVID-related impact of $60 million or approximately 2.7 percentage points.

我們的閃存毛利率為 36.1%，環比下降 0.9 個百分點。這包括與 COVID 相關的 1000 萬美元或約 0.4 個百分點的影響。我們的硬盤毛利率為 30.6%，環比下降 0.3 個百分點。這包括與 COVID 相關的 6000 萬美元或約 2.7 個百分點的影響。

Operating expenses of $741 million were below our guidance range due to prudent cost control and lower variable compensation expense. Operating income was $882 million, representing a 7% decrease from the prior quarter and 157% increase year-over-year, highlighting our ability to drive profitable growth. Earnings per share was $2.30, which exceeded the high end of our guidance range.

由於審慎的成本控制和較低的可變薪酬費用，7.41 億美元的運營費用低於我們的指導範圍。營業收入為 8.82 億美元，比上一季度下降 7%，同比增長 157%，凸顯了我們推動盈利增長的能力。每股收益為 2.30 美元，超出了我們指導範圍的上限。

Operating cash flow for the second quarter was $666 million, and free cash flow was $407 million. Despite a slight increase in inventory due to supply chain disruption, we maintained strong cash flow generation in the quarter.

第二季度的經營現金流為 6.66 億美元，自由現金流為 4.07 億美元。儘管由於供應鏈中斷導致庫存略有增加，但我們在本季度保持了強勁的現金流產生。

Capital expenditures, which include the purchase of property, plant and equipment and activity related to our flash joint ventures on our cash flow statement, was a cash outflow of $259 million. We remain prudent in investing in manufacturing capacity and continue to expect gross CapEx for the current fiscal year to be around $3 billion. We now expect cash CapEx to be around $1.5 billion as we actively manage our overall spending.

資本支出，包括購買不動產、廠房和設備以及與我們現金流量表上的閃速合資企業相關的活動，是現金流出 2.59 億美元。我們在投資製造能力方面保持謹慎，並繼續預計本財年的總資本支出約為 30 億美元。我們現在預計現金資本支出約為 15 億美元，因為我們積極管理我們的整體支出。

As we mentioned on our last earnings call, we fully repaid our Term Loan B in the amount of $943 million last October. In addition, last December, we closed a public offering of $1 billion in senior unsecured notes and repaid $1.3 billion on our Term Loan A, bringing our gross debt outstanding to $7.4 billion at the end of the fiscal second quarter.

正如我們在上次財報電話會議中提到的，我們在去年 10 月全額償還了 9.43 億美元的定期貸款 B。此外，去年 12 月，我們完成了 10 億美元高級無擔保票據的公開發售，並償還了 13 億美元的定期貸款 A，使我們的未償債務總額在第二財季末達到 74 億美元。

On top of that, earlier this month, we entered into an agreement with our lenders to revise the terms of our loan agreement to reflect our improved credit ratings and to extend the maturity of our term loan and revolving credit facility from 2023 to 2027. Our trailing 12-month adjusted EBITDA at the end of the second quarter as defined in our credit agreement was $4.8 billion, resulting in a gross leverage ratio of 1.5x. This compares to 3.0x in the third fiscal quarter of 2020, when we announced the plan to focus on debt repayment to achieve greater financial flexibility.

最重要的是，本月早些時候，我們與貸方達成了一項協議，以修改我們的貸款協議條款，以反映我們提高的信用評級，並將我們的定期貸款和循環信貸額度的期限從 2023 年延長至 2027 年。我們的根據我們的信貸協議，截至第二季度末的 12 個月調整後 EBITDA 為 48 億美元，總槓桿率為 1.5 倍。相比之下，2020 年第三財季為 3.0 倍，當時我們宣布計劃專注於償還債務以實現更大的財務靈活性。

As a reminder, our credit agreement includes $1 billion in depreciation add-back associated with the flash ventures. This is not reflected in our cash flow statement. Please refer to our earnings presentation on the Investor Relations website for further details.

提醒一下，我們的信貸協議包括與閃現企業相關的 10 億美元折舊加回。這沒有反映在我們的現金流量表中。請參閱我們在投資者關係網站上的收益報告了解更多詳情。

Considering the transitory supply chain challenges we discussed earlier, I would like to provide a bit more color on our view of both hard drive and Flash businesses in calendar 2022. Within our hard drive segment, we expect hard drive revenue to decrease on a sequential basis in the third fiscal quarter. While the supply chain disruptions at some of our customers are expected to remain, the larger issue of late has been our ability to source components to meet customer demand. We expect revenue to return to sequential growth in the fiscal fourth quarter.

考慮到我們之前討論過的暫時性供應鏈挑戰，我想為我們在 2022 年日曆中對硬盤和閃存業務的看法提供更多色彩。在我們的硬盤領域，我們預計硬盤收入將連續下降在第三財季。雖然我們的一些客戶的供應鏈中斷預計將繼續存在，但最近更大的問題是我們採購組件以滿足客戶需求的能力。我們預計第四財季收入將恢復環比增長。

While overall hard drive pricing is expected to remain relatively stable, we expect gross margins to decline 2 to 3 percentage points from the fiscal second quarter through the fiscal fourth quarter due primarily to component cost inflation.

雖然預計整體硬盤定價將保持相對穩定，但我們預計毛利率將從第二財季到第四財季下降 2 至 3 個百分點，主要是由於組件成本上漲。

Within our Flash segment, we expect Flash revenue to decrease on a sequential basis in the fiscal third quarter driven by ASP. We expect Flash revenue to return to growth in the second half of calendar year 2022. Furthermore, we anticipate downward pressure on gross margins for the first half of this calendar year as cost reductions revert towards our long-term target of 15%.

在我們的 Flash 部門中，我們預計 Flash 收入將在 ASP 的推動下在第三財季連續下降。我們預計 Flash 收入將在 2022 年下半年恢復增長。此外，我們預計本日曆年上半年的毛利率將面臨下行壓力，因為成本降低將恢復到我們 15% 的長期目標。

In regard to our fiscal third quarter, our non-GAAP guidance is as follows. We expect revenue to be in the range of $4.45 billion to $4.65 billion with a sequential revenue decline for both Flash and hard drive businesses. We expect gross margin to be between 30% and 32%. We expect operating expenses to be between $750 million and $770 million. Interest and other expenses are expected to be approximately $70 million. Our tax rate is expected to be approximately 11% in the third quarter and for the fiscal year. We expect earnings per share to be between $1.50 and $1.80 in the third quarter, assuming approximately 318 million fully diluted shares outstanding.

關於我們的第三財季，我們的非公認會計準則指導如下。我們預計收入將在 44.5 億美元至 46.5 億美元之間，閃存和硬盤業務的收入將連續下降。我們預計毛利率在 30% 至 32% 之間。我們預計運營費用將在 7.5 億美元至 7.7 億美元之間。利息和其他費用預計約為 7000 萬美元。我們的稅率預計在第三季度和本財年約為 11%。假設大約有 3.18 億股完全稀釋的流通股，我們預計第三季度的每股收益將在 1.50 美元至 1.80 美元之間。

I'll now turn the call back over to Dave.

我現在將電話轉回戴夫。

Thanks, Bob. Looking ahead, we remain optimistic about our business outlook in calendar year 2022 as our customers continue to indicate strong end demand across cloud, client and consumer end markets. Despite the transitory issues we discussed earlier, it is clearer than ever that we have the right foundation for long-term growth and the right technology portfolio in place to ensure that we are successful in scaling our business.

謝謝，鮑勃。展望未來，我們對 2022 日曆年的業務前景保持樂觀，因為我們的客戶繼續表示雲、客戶端和消費者終端市場的終端需求強勁。儘管我們之前討論了暫時的問題，但我們比以往任何時候都更清楚的是，我們擁有長期增長的正確基礎和正確的技術組合，以確保我們成功地擴展業務。

Over the last couple of years, we have made significant changes necessary to improve our focus, sharpen execution and set strategic goals to place Western Digital in a position of greater strength. And I'm excited that we are starting to see the fruits of those changes.

在過去的幾年裡，我們做出了必要的重大改變，以提高我們的專注力、加強執行力並設定戰略目標，使西部數據處於更強大的地位。我很高興我們開始看到這些變化的成果。

Before I finish today, I'd like to take a moment to comment on the CFO transition we announced earlier this afternoon. As you may have seen, we announced that Wissam Jabre will be joining Western Digital as Chief Financial Officer effective the week of February 7. Wissam was most recently Chief Financial Officer at Dialog Semiconductor. In addition to his deep financial and semiconductor expertise, Wissam also has technical expertise, and importantly, shares Western Digital's values of collaboration and innovation. You can read more about his background in the press release issued today.

在今天結束之前，我想花點時間評論一下我們今天下午早些時候宣布的 CFO 過渡。如您所見，我們宣布 Wissam Jabre 將於 2 月 7 日這一周加入西部數據，擔任首席財務官。Wissam 最近擔任 Dialog Semiconductor 的首席財務官。除了深厚的金融和半導體專業知識外，Wissam 還擁有技術專長，重要的是，他認同西部數據的協作和創新價值觀。您可以在今天發布的新聞稿中了解有關他的背景的更多信息。

I'd like to extend my sincere thanks on behalf of the entire Board and management team to Bob for his dedication and hard work at the service of Western Digital. During my tenure as CEO, I've greatly benefited from his friendship and expertise. He's been an essential part of our leadership team, guiding key aspects of our strategy. Among many other contributions, Bob drove a capital allocation strategy that has led to significant repayment of our debt, marked this quarter by Western Digital's second investment-grade corporate rating. Bob's insight was also instrumental in helping us navigate COVID uncertainty and execute other strategic changes at the company to position us for growth and value creation.

我謹代表整個董事會和管理團隊向 Bob 致以誠摯的謝意，感謝他在西部數據服務中的奉獻精神和辛勤工作。在我擔任 CEO 期間，我從他的友誼和專業知識中受益匪淺。他一直是我們領導團隊的重要組成部分，指導我們戰略的關鍵方面。在許多其他貢獻中，Bob 推動了一項資本配置策略，該策略導致我們大量償還債務，本季度西部數據獲得了第二個投資級公司評級。 Bob 的洞察力還有助於幫助我們應對 COVID 的不確定性並在公司執行其他戰略變革，從而為我們的增長和價值創造做好準備。

Next quarter, you'll have an opportunity to hear from Wissam. I know he's looking forward to it.

下個季度，您將有機會聽取 Wissam 的意見。我知道他很期待。

With that, Peter, let's begin the Q&A.

有了這個，彼得，讓我們開始問答吧。

(Operator Instructions) Our first question will come from Aaron Rakers with Wells Fargo.

（操作員說明）我們的第一個問題將來自富國銀行的 Aaron Rakers。

I guess I want to dive into, obviously, the hard disk drive results. I mean, by my math, it looks like your capacity shift in nearline declined by about high teens or even 20% sequential. Can you help dissect the impact of your larger cloud customers having their own supply constraints relative to the comment of your own component availability? And then on top of that, gross margin in this next quarter, I know you alluded to, but how much COVID costs are you factoring into the gross margin expectation with 2 to 3 percentage points decline?

顯然，我想我想深入研究硬盤驅動器的結果。我的意思是，根據我的數學，看起來你在近線的容量轉移下降了大約十幾歲，甚至連續下降了 20%。您能否幫助剖析較大的雲客戶相對於您自己的組件可用性評論具有自己的供應限制的影響？最重要的是，我知道你提到了下個季度的毛利率，但是你在毛利率預期中考慮了多少 COVID 成本，毛利率下降了 2 到 3 個百分點？

Okay. I'll take a crack at it. Aaron, thanks for the question and thanks for joining us, as always. So, I don't think it was quite down quite as much as you said. I think we're kind of like mid-teens. A big piece of that is, we talked about it last quarter, we have one very, very large customer that's going through some challenges of their own. And now we have issues with our own supply chain.

好的。我會試一試。亞倫，謝謝你的提問，也謝謝你一如既往地加入我們。所以，我認為它並沒有你說的那麼嚴重。我覺得我們有點像中年人。其中很大一部分是，我們在上個季度談到了它，我們有一個非常非常大的客戶正在經歷他們自己的一些挑戰。現在我們自己的供應鏈也有問題。

So I would say in the last quarter, it was primarily on the customer side. And as we went through the quarter, it started to creep in on our own components. And as we move into the next quarter, it's much more of a component issue as the rest of the market normalizes out or the customer normalizes out.

所以我想說在上個季度，它主要是在客戶方面。當我們度過這個季度時，它開始蔓延到我們自己的組件上。隨著我們進入下一季度，隨著市場的其餘部分正常化或客戶正常化，這更像是一個組件問題。

On the COVID costs, you saw they're going up, and I'll let Bob comment through this in more detail. But the health and safety and logistics costs continue to go up. We've seen that over the last couple of quarters, and now we're seeing component costs that are almost approaching that same level of spend as far as increases. So I thought I'd give you some idea of sizing it.

關於 COVID 成本，您看到它們正在上升，我會讓 Bob 更詳細地評論一下。但健康和安全以及物流成本繼續上升。在過去的幾個季度中，我們已經看到了這一點，現在我們看到組件成本幾乎接近相同的支出水平。所以我想我會給你一些關於大小的想法。

But Bob, you want to...

但是鮑勃，你想...

Yes. I can add a little more detail. I think that the COVID costs we've been reporting, which are the logistics costs and the costs in the factory associated with keeping our employees safe, probably peaked in the second fiscal quarter at the $70 million. I think it will come down some in the third quarter, and hopefully, continue to come down from there. The logistics costs, as you know, have been elevated for probably at least 6 quarters now.

是的。我可以添加更多細節。我認為我們一直在報告的 COVID 成本，即物流成本和工廠與確保員工安全相關的成本，可能在第二財季達到 7000 萬美元的峰值。我認為它會在第三季度有所下降，並希望繼續從那裡下降。如您所知，物流成本已經上漲了至少 6 個季度。

The thing that's different as we look at the next quarter or 2 are the component costs, and we're seeing a lot of inflationary pressures on the component costs. We think those are transitory, a lot of expedite fees, a lot of expenses associated with trying to get the parts in so we can get the products built and delivered. So I think that's really what's different as we look forward the next quarter or 2.

當我們看到下一季度或第二季度時，不同的是組件成本，我們看到組件成本面臨很多通脹壓力。我們認為這些都是暫時的，需要大量的加急費用，以及與嘗試獲取零件相關的大量費用，以便我們能夠製造和交付產品。所以我認為這真的是我們期待下一季度或第二季度的不同之處。

The other thing, Aaron, I'll just wrap up by saying, I mean, as we look forward into the next quarter, we're expecting right about on seasonality for our hard drive business. I would say earlier -- midway through last quarter, we were hoping to do better than that because we saw the demand there. But there's a significant amount of unmet demand that we just can't meet given the component constraints. But even with all that included, we believe we're back on a more seasonal number.

另一件事，Aaron，我只想說，我的意思是，當我們展望下一個季度時，我們預計硬盤業務的季節性是正確的。我早些時候會說 - 在上個季度中期，我們希望做得比這更好，因為我們看到了那裡的需求。但是鑑於組件限制，我們無法滿足大量未滿足的需求。但即使包括所有這些，我們相信我們又回到了一個更具季節性的數字上。

Our next question will come from C.J. Muse with Evercore.

我們的下一個問題將來自 C.J. Muse 和 Evercore。

I guess to follow up on Aaron's question, can you speak to when you expect these constraints to no longer be a headwind? And as part of the higher component costs, is there a point in time where you can -- where contracts can be renegotiated and you can increase those higher input costs in terms of your pricing?

我想跟進 Aaron 的問題，當你預計這些限制不再是逆風時，你能談談嗎？作為較高組件成本的一部分，您是否可以在某個時間點重新談判合同，並且您可以在定價方面增加這些較高的投入成本？

Yes. So there's -- first of all, thanks for the question and thanks for joining us again. There's a lot to unpack in that question. Let me take a bit of a crack at it. So the component constraints are not necessarily new. We've been dealing with them for a long time. I think early in the pandemic, we were able to qualify additional component suppliers, diversify. And then as things went on, we would always remix and do what we could to get the most out of the components we could get. It's just gotten to the point now where it's getting even more constrained. And quite frankly, a little bit more surprises that orders that we thought were going to show up get either delayed or canceled. So we continue to work through that.

是的。所以有-首先，感謝您提出問題並感謝您再次加入我們。這個問題有很多東西要解開。讓我試一試。所以組件約束不一定是新的。我們已經和他們打交道很長時間了。我認為在大流行初期，我們能夠使更多的組件供應商獲得資格，從而實現多元化。然後隨著事情的發展，我們總是會重新混合併盡我們所能來充分利用我們可以獲得的組件。它現在已經到了受到更多限制的地步。坦率地說，我們認為會出現的訂單要么被推遲要么被取消，這讓我們有些意外。所以我們繼續努力解決這個問題。

So to your point, there's a number of dynamics about why it gets better. One, we stay very close to our suppliers, and we will obviously work many quarters into the future. And we can see as we get through the first half of the year, things get better. We also -- the technology moves forward. And in some cases, we just move on to different nodes in the semiconductor business that have more availability on them. So we know as the portfolio shifts, things are going to free up.

因此，就您的觀點而言，有許多動態可以說明為什麼它會變得更好。第一，我們與供應商保持非常密切的關係，顯然我們將在未來的許多季度工作。我們可以看到，隨著我們度過上半年，情況會變得更好。我們也——技術向前發展。在某些情況下，我們只是轉移到半導體業務中具有更多可用性的不同節點。所以我們知道，隨著投資組合的變化，事情將會得到釋放。

And then to your point, the longer it goes, we can negotiate longer contracts and kind of look at the relationship with all of our suppliers to get back to a position where we have more predictability both on the supply side and on the pricing side of it.

然後根據您的觀點，時間越長，我們可以協商更長的合同，並查看與所有供應商的關係，以回到我們在供應方面和定價方面都有更多可預測性的位置它。

That's very helpful. And as my follow-up on the NAND side of things, I think you've historically talked about the transactional market kind of as a leading indicator. And so curious, as you look into March, how are you thinking about pricing? And I know you don't guide pricing, but curious, is there a larger headwind like-for-like or on a blended basis as you sit here today and consider the likely mix?

這很有幫助。作為我對 NAND 方面的後續跟進，我認為您歷來都將交易市場視為領先指標。很好奇，當您進入三月份時，您如何考慮定價？而且我知道您不指導定價，但很好奇，當您今天坐在這裡並考慮可能的組合時，是否存在更大的逆風？

I would say pricing is -- look, I mean, I said it in the script. Pricing has stabilized in the more transactional markets. I think there was a little bit -- I think the narrative in the industry given some of the shutdowns that are going on, would it flow through immediately? We haven't seen that. But we did see a stabilization.

我想說定價是——看，我的意思是，我在劇本中說過。在交易較多的市場中，價格已趨於穩定。我認為有一點——我認為考慮到一些正在進行的停工，行業中的敘述會立即通過嗎？我們還沒有看到。但我們確實看到了穩定。

Also it's worth noting that majority of the portfolio is priced before we go into the quarter, and that happened before any of the events of the shutdowns in China. So that's not going to show up for another quarter or 2.

另外值得注意的是，大部分投資組合都是在我們進入本季度之前定價的，而這發生在中國任何停工事件之前。所以這不會在另一個季度或 2 個季度出現。

But I would say we're seeing more stabilization. Our view, I think, has been that we will see better pricing in the second half, and that's pretty much the way it's playing out. Depending on kind of the impacts of some of the shutdowns, that may move forward a little bit. But I think mainly the impacts of what we've seen -- impact on NAND pricing is going to be more second half favorable, including some of the stuff we're seeing now on even the tool vendors, the component issues hitting them. So we're watching that very closely. I would say right now, we've got a more stable environment over the last 2, 3 weeks.

但我會說我們看到了更多的穩定。我認為，我們的觀點是，我們將在下半年看到更好的定價，這幾乎就是它的表現方式。根據一些關閉的影響類型，這可能會向前推進一點。但我認為主要是我們所看到的影響——對 NAND 定價的影響將在下半年更加有利，包括我們現在甚至在工具供應商身上看到的一些東西，以及對他們造成影響的組件問題。所以我們正在密切關注這一點。我現在想說的是，在過去的 2、3 週內，我們的環境更加穩定。

Our next question will come from Joe Moore with Morgan Stanley.

我們的下一個問題將來自摩根士丹利的喬摩爾。

Just following up on the NAND question. You guys have been going through this BiCS5 transition, and I know part of that has sort of -- as you're waiting for controllers and qualifications that you end up in those more transactional markets. Where are you from a mix standpoint? Is that still a negative impact in the March quarter? And do you see that at some point reversing as you start to get traction in other markets with BiCS5?

只是跟進NAND問題。你們一直在經歷這個 BiCS5 過渡，我知道其中的一部分 - 因為你正在等待你最終進入那些更具交易性的市場的控制器和資格。從混合的角度來看，你在哪裡？這對 3 月季度仍有負面影響嗎？當您開始使用 BiCS5 在其他市場獲得牽引力時，您是否看到這種情況會發生逆轉？

Yes. Joe, thanks for the question. So definitely, as we go through the year, the mix gets better on BiCS5. It starts out in more transactional markets. Consumer, it's moved into mobile, it's moved into gaming. This quarter, we'll start to ramp client and then more of that as we go through the year. And then in the second half of the year, we'll ramp BiCS5 into enterprise SSD. And that's really where the whole enterprise SSD story comes together.

是的。喬，謝謝你的問題。所以毫無疑問，隨著我們這一年的過去，BiCS5 的組合會變得更好。它始於更多交易市場。消費者，它已經進入了移動領域，它已經進入了遊戲領域。本季度，我們將開始增加客戶數量，然後隨著這一年的發展而增加更多。然後在下半年，我們會將 BiCS5 推廣到企業級 SSD。這就是整個企業 SSD 故事的真正意義所在。

We've got -- this year, we went through all the qualifications. That's BiCS4 material right now, which is in shorter supply. And then as we ramp that into BiCS5 throughout the year, the mix gets better as we go throughout the year. So it's a really important point and one of the reasons why when we talk about the setup for 2022, as we go forward, the portfolio gets stronger.

我們已經 - 今年，我們通過了所有的資格。那是現在供應短缺的 BiCS4 材料。然後，隨著我們全年將其加入 BiCS5，隨著我們全年的進行，這種組合會變得更好。因此，這是非常重要的一點，也是為什麼當我們談論 2022 年的設置時，隨著我們前進，投資組合會變得更強大的原因之一。

Great. And then in NAND, I don't know if you mentioned because I've been on multiple calls, but have you had constraints from SSD controllers as well as HDD and power management? Anything else that's constraining on the NAND side of the business?

偉大的。然後在 NAND 中，我不知道您是否提到過，因為我已經接聽了多次電話，但是您是否受到 SSD 控制器以及 HDD 和電源管理的限制？還有什麼其他限制業務的 NAND 方面的因素嗎？

Oh, yes. I would say the NAND -- the business we're leaving on the table in the NAND business is higher than in the drive business. It's significant in the drive business, in the order of $100 million to $150 million in the third quarter there. But in the Flash business, it's basically twice that. So yes, it's controllers, it's power ICs, it's a number of different parts on enterprise SSDs and embedded as well.

哦是的。我想說的是 NAND——我們在 NAND 業務中保留的業務高於驅動器業務。這在驅動業務中意義重大，第三季度的銷售額在 1 億至 1.5 億美元之間。但在 Flash 業務中，它基本上是兩倍。所以是的，它是控制器，它是電源 IC，它是企業 SSD 和嵌入式上的許多不同部件。

Our next question will come from Karl Ackerman with Cowen.

我們的下一個問題將來自 Karl Ackerman 和 Cowen。

Two questions, if I may. It's great to see crossover of BiCS5 this quarter. But may you discuss the timing of ramping BiCS6? I ask given your plans to reduce cash CapEx and expectations for a moderation in NAND cost declines. And I have a follow-up, please.

兩個問題，如果可以的話。很高興看到本季度 BiCS5 的交叉。但是您能討論一下 BiCS6 的升級時機嗎？考慮到您減少現金資本支出的計劃以及對 NAND 成本下降放緩的預期，我問。我有一個跟進，拜託。

So we expect -- so first of all, let me talk about how we think about ramping different nodes. I mean the main thing we're looking at is the cost side of it. So the cost numbers, good again this quarter. We expect that to revert closer to the $15 million that we always talk about modeling. It's been above it, I think, for 9 quarters in a row now.

所以我們期待 - 首先，讓我談談我們如何考慮增加不同的節點。我的意思是，我們主要關注的是成本方面。因此，本季度的成本數據再次好轉。我們預計這將恢復到接近我們一直談論建模的 1500 萬美元。我認為，它已經連續 9 個季度超過它了。

But still, the nodes are producing, and we're getting the cost we need as we go forward. We -- BiCS4 was a great node for us on yields, record yields. We expect BiCS5 to be -- that BiCS5 is the most capital-efficient node the team has ever built. And so at this point, we expect BiCS6 to be in FY '23 type of ramp. We've got lots of runway on BiCS5.

但是，節點仍在生產，我們正在獲得前進所需的成本。我們——BiCS4 對我們來說是一個很好的節點，產量創紀錄。我們預計 BiCS5 將是——BiCS5 是團隊有史以來建造的最具資本效率的節點。因此，在這一點上，我們預計 BiCS6 將處於 23 財年的坡道。我們在 BiCS5 上有很多跑道。

I appreciate that. For my follow-up, there have been some investor concerns that channel inventory has been increasing for non-enterprise hard drives and retail areas of the NAND market. I'm curious whether that's the case for you. It doesn't appear that way given the constraints you are seeing from a component perspective. But if you could just discuss the level of visibility and the amount of channel inventory you see or the leanness of that, that would be very helpful.

我很感激。在我的跟進中，有一些投資者擔心非企業硬盤和 NAND 市場零售領域的渠道庫存一直在增加。我很好奇你是不是這樣。考慮到您從組件角度看到的約束，它看起來並不是這樣。但是，如果您可以僅討論可見性水平和您看到的渠道庫存量或精簡程度，那將非常有幫助。

Yes. I don't think it's anything noteworthy that's particularly out of the norm across the portfolio. We talked a little bit about some stuff last quarter that's normalized. So there's really nothing to call out.

是的。我認為在整個投資組合中沒有什麼特別值得注意的。我們在上個季度談到了一些標準化的東西。所以真的沒什麼好說的。

I don't know, Bob, is there anything to come to mind from your perspective?

我不知道，鮑勃，從你的角度來看，你有什麼想法嗎？

No. I think we're within normal ranges in every region.

不，我認為我們在每個地區都在正常範圍內。

Our next question will come from Mehdi Hosseini with SIG.

我們的下一個問題將來自 SIG 的 Mehdi Hosseini。

Two follow-ups. I want to go back to the supply chain dynamics for HDD. And now that -- two follow-ups here. Now that you're actually impacted by component shortages, is that -- if you were willing to pay a higher premium, would you actually be able to procure the components you needed? Is that just holding going on in the supply chain or just the parts are not available, no matter how much a premium you're willing to pay? And I have a follow-up.

兩個後續。我想回到 HDD 的供應鏈動態。現在，這裡有兩個後續行動。既然您實際上受到了組件短缺的影響，那麼如果您願意支付更高的保費，您真的能夠採購到您需要的組件嗎？無論您願意支付多少溢價，這只是供應鏈中的情況還是只是零件不可用？我有一個後續行動。

Well, I think there's a premium to get them. And so we have good contracts with our suppliers. So -- but there are premiums to get the pieces. But like I said, there's just more variability on timing, especially in the fact that orders that have been placed many, many, many quarters in advance, then we get pushouts.

好吧，我認為獲得它們是有溢價的。因此，我們與供應商簽訂了良好的合同。所以——但是要得到這些碎片是有溢價的。但就像我說的那樣，時間上的變化更大，尤其是提前很多很多很多個季度下達的訂單，然後我們就會被淘汰。

I think your question is, are we just not paying for them? Are they available? And I think it's a mix. I mean we're definitely -- we definitely have to pay more to get what we need, and there are some pieces that are just getting delayed and -- especially later in the planning cycle where it's more difficult to mitigate the impacts.

我認為你的問題是，我們只是不為他們付錢嗎？它們可用嗎？我認為這是一個混合體。我的意思是我們肯定——我們肯定需要付出更多才能得到我們需要的東西，而且有些部分只是被推遲了——尤其是在規劃週期的後期，更難以減輕影響。

And a follow-up to that, when I look at your December quarter, you were impacted by one particular customer, and now it's a supply chain issue. Does that mean that we should expect a step-function in your HDD shipment, especially into the September quarter? Or is the recovery in recouping these loss shipment and revenue is going to be more gradual?

對此的後續行動，當我查看您的 12 月季度時，您受到了一個特定客戶的影響，現在這是一個供應鏈問題。這是否意味著我們應該期待您的硬盤出貨量出現階躍功能，尤其是到 9 月季度？或者是在彌補這些損失的出貨量和收入方面的複蘇將更加緩慢？

Yes. Well, look, let's talk about it. I mean, I think we're back on seasonality as we go into Q1. We obviously have a margin impact. We expect the revenue -- Q3 to be the bottom on the revenue in that business. I think the margin will probably hit the bottom in the next quarter, but we'll see some sequential growth.

是的。好吧，看，讓我們談談它。我的意思是，我認為我們在進入第一季度時又回到了季節性。我們顯然會對利潤產生影響。我們預計收入——第三季度將成為該業務收入的最低點。我認為利潤率可能會在下個季度觸底，但我們會看到一些連續增長。

What I can say is when we look at calendar Q2, calendar Q3 through the end of the year, the demand signals from our customers are very strong. So assuming we get the parts -- and like I said, especially in the drive business, as the portfolio transitions, we move on to different nodes that are freer as far as getting the controllers. That's why we have more confidence in the second half of the year.

我可以說的是，當我們查看日曆 Q2、日曆 Q3 到年底時，我們客戶的需求信號非常強烈。因此，假設我們得到了零件——就像我說的，特別是在驅動業務中，隨著產品組合的轉換，我們轉向不同的節點，這些節點在獲得控制器方面更自由。這就是我們對下半年更有信心的原因。

Got it. And Bob, good -- best of luck in your next endeavor.

知道了。鮑勃，好——祝你下一次努力好運。

All right. Thanks, Mehdi.

好的。謝謝，邁赫迪。

Thanks, Mehdi.

謝謝，邁赫迪。

Our next question will come from Toshiya Hari with Goldman Sachs.

我們的下一個問題將來自高盛的 Toshiya Hari。

I've got two as well. Dave, I guess you've been focused on, I guess, shifting your ACD business from a more kind of transactional business to one that's more perhaps a little bit more strategic and longer term in terms of how you engage with your customers. Any progress on the LTA front over the past couple of quarters?

我也有兩個。戴夫，我猜你一直專注於，我猜，將你的 ACD 業務從一種更具交易性的業務轉變為一種更具戰略性和長期性的業務，就你如何與客戶互動而言。在過去的幾個季度中，LTA 方面有什麼進展嗎？

Yes. I think the business is definitely changing. I mean we've talked about this for a couple of years. And let me just frame it up as a kind of where we were when we walked into 2021 and where are we when we walk into 2022.

是的。我認為業務肯定在發生變化。我的意思是我們已經討論了幾年了。讓我把它描述為我們進入 2021 年時所處的位置以及進入 2022 年時所處的位置。

And so as we go into '22, we're clearly -- we clearly have strong customer demand. I mean in the first quarter, we have more demand than we can meet. We have customers asking us for upsides. And we get good demand signals as we move through the year.

因此，當我們進入 22 年時，我們顯然——我們顯然有強烈的客戶需求。我的意思是在第一季度，我們的需求超出了我們的能力範圍。我們有客戶要求我們提供好處。隨著這一年的發展，我們得到了良好的需求信號。

The LTA percentage, to your point, are multi-quarter agreements. I'm starting to say a little more precise. On the drive business, when we walked into '21, we had -- we knew were maybe a low to mid-single percent of our exabytes were going to go through agreements. And as we walk into '22, that's more like 1/3 of the portfolio. So you've seen a dramatic -- we've seen a dramatic difference in what we understand about how much our customers are going to take, especially the biggest of the big customers, what their demand's going to look like, what are they committing to. That obviously helps us plan, that helps us work on pricing. So it's a very, very different situation.

就您而言，LTA 百分比是多季度協議。我開始說得更準確一點。在驅動器業務上，當我們進入 21 世紀時，我們知道——我們知道我們的 EB 中可能只有低到中的百分之一會通過協議。當我們進入 22 年時，這更像是投資組合的 1/3。所以你已經看到了一個戲劇性的 - 我們已經看到了我們對客戶將要接受多少的理解的巨大差異，尤其是最大的大客戶，他們的需求會是什麼樣子，他們承諾了什麼到。這顯然有助於我們計劃，這有助於我們進行定價。所以這是一個非常非常不同的情況。

From a portfolio point of view, we walked into calendar year '21 when we were talking about commercializing energy-assist. We walk into '22 not only having commercialized energy-assist and got the areal density gains from it. We've also launched OptiNAND. We got back on our front foot with 18 and ramped that. Now we're ramping 20.

從投資組合的角度來看，當我們談論能源輔助商業化時，我們走進了 21 日曆年。我們走進 '22 不僅擁有商業化的能源輔助，並從中獲得了面密度收益。我們還推出了 OptiNAND。我們以 18 人的成績重新站穩了腳跟，並將其推向了高潮。現在我們正在增加 20 個。

Something we talked about in the script, which has evolved over the year is we're seeing much more interest now from the big customers in SMR. That's something we've been investing in for many years. We've always thought it's been good technology. OptiNAND helps deliver a better SMR drive and better areal density. And we expect by the end of the year, we're going to have multiple cloud titans deploying SMR at scale.

我們在劇本中談到了這一年的演變，我們現在看到 SMR 的大客戶對我們產生了更多的興趣。這是我們多年來一直在投資的東西。我們一直認為這是一項很好的技術。 OptiNAND 有助於提供更好的 SMR 驅動器和更好的面密度。我們預計到今年年底，我們將有多個雲巨頭大規模部署 SMR。

On the Flash side of the business, we talked about BiCS5 and kind of where we are there and how that portfolio gets stronger throughout the year. And then I think as we go through '22, we're just in a better financial situation than we were before. To the -- and as we talked about on the call, getting back to a shareholder return policy, which we're all very much looking forward to as we move into FY '23.

在 Flash 業務方面，我們談到了 BiCS5 以及我們在那裡的情況以及該產品組合如何在一年中變得更強大。然後我認為，當我們度過 22 年時，我們的財務狀況比以前更好。對於 - 正如我們在電話會議上談到的那樣，回到股東回報政策，當我們進入 23 財年時，我們都非常期待。

So maybe a little broader than your question, sorry, but we -- LTAs in the drive business have become a meaningful increase in the percent of our exabytes and where they're going to be placed throughout the year.

因此，抱歉，可能比您的問題更廣泛一些，但我們 - 驅動器業務中的 LTA 已經成為我們 EB 的百分比以及全年它們將被放置的位置的有意義的增長。

Got it. That's super helpful. And then as my follow-up, Dave, you mentioned at the very end of your response on the shareholder return aspect of the business, it's next fiscal year, which is great. What's sort of the internal debate when you think about dividend versus share repurchases? And just given the evolving macro backdrop and sort of the rate backdrop, any change in how you think about and how you approach capital allocation at a high level?

知道了。這非常有幫助。然後作為我的後續行動，戴夫，你在回复的最後提到了企業的股東回報方面，這是下一個財政年度，這很棒。當您考慮股息與股票回購時，內部爭論是什麼？考慮到不斷變化的宏觀背景和某種利率背景，您在高水平上思考和處理資本配置的方式有什麼變化嗎？

Yes. I think we'll have more to say about that as we get a little bit closer. I mean one of the things we're going to do is talk to our shareholders and get their input on that question, and then we'll have more to say about it. So I don't know if it's an internal debate just yet, but we're just really looking forward to getting to that point. We've spent 18 months now paying down well over $2 billion worth of debt. We have the ability -- we've made a lot of changes in our execution in the portfolio to generate more cash, and we're looking forward to returning that to our shareholders.

是的。我想隨著我們的距離越來越近，我們會有更多的話要說。我的意思是我們要做的一件事是與我們的股東交談並聽取他們對這個問題的意見，然後我們會有更多的發言權。所以我不知道這是否是一場內部辯論，但我們真的很期待達到這一點。我們已經用了 18 個月的時間償還了價值超過 20 億美元的債務。我們有能力——我們對投資組合的執行進行了很多改變，以產生更多現金，我們期待著將其返還給我們的股東。

(Operator Instructions) Our next question will come from Timothy Arcuri with UBS.

（操作員說明）我們的下一個問題將來自瑞銀的 Timothy Arcuri。

This is Jason Park on for Tim Arcuri. So just I have one question. My question is on HDD. So we just wanted to ask how your 20 terabyte is ramping throughout this calendar year. As you guys know, your competitor provided some color on this last night, saying there's 20 terabyte will be one of the fastest ramp ever. So if you guys could provide any details on how your 18- and 20-terabyte ramp is going, that would be helpful.

這是蒂姆·阿庫裡（Tim Arcuri）的傑森·帕克（Jason Park）。所以我只有一個問題。我的問題是關於硬盤的。所以我們只是想問問你的 20 TB 在整個日曆年中是如何增長的。如你們所知，你們的競爭對手昨晚對此提供了一些色彩，稱 20 TB 將是有史以來最快的斜坡之一。因此，如果你們能提供有關 18 和 20 TB 坡道進展情況的任何詳細信息，那將很有幫助。

Yes. 20 is -- I guess what I would say is 20 is ramping. It's not going to ramp. It is ramping. I mean if I look at units shipped in the last quarter, we're up to a high single-digit percent already of units that are going out at 20. And like I said, we see high interest because we have some very, very large customers going to SMR. And so you're going to get more bang for your buck there with the gains you get on SMR, and OptiNAND is a technology that makes that even more efficient. So we feel really good about where 20 is. We feel good about where the technology is, and we think it's going to be a very successful ramp. I'll just leave it at that.

是的。 20 是——我想我想說的是 20 正在上升。它不會傾斜。它正在加速。我的意思是，如果我查看上一季度出貨的單位，我們已經達到了 20 個單位的高個位數百分比。就像我說的，我們看到了很高的興趣，因為我們有一些非常非常大客戶去 SMR。因此，您將在 SMR 上獲得更多收益，從而獲得更多收益，而 OptiNAND 是一項使這一過程更加高效的技術。所以我們對 20 的位置感覺非常好。我們對技術在哪裡感覺很好，我們認為這將是一個非常成功的斜坡。我就這樣吧。

Our next question will come from Vijay Rakesh with Mizuho.

我們的下一個問題將來自瑞穗的 Vijay Rakesh。

Just a question here. On your March quarter Flash guide, I think you talked about price might be a little bit -- pricing will be a little bit softer. Wondering, mix should be more positive for you guys, right, because mobile probably comes in and you have a better mix of, it might be retail and enterprise, et cetera. So I was wondering why margins wouldn't be more stable in the Flash side in the March quarter. And also, I think you mentioned component cost inflation. I was wondering if this is actual component costs or logistics costs? Or what exactly the component cost inflation was?

這裡只是一個問題。在您的 3 月季度 Flash 指南中，我認為您談到的價格可能有點——定價會更溫和一些。想知道，混合對你們來說應該更積極，對，因為移動設備可能會出現，而且你有更好的組合，它可能是零售和企業等。所以我想知道為什麼 Flash 方面的利潤率在 3 月季度不會更加穩定。而且，我認為您提到了組件成本膨脹。我想知道這是實際的組件成本還是物流成本？或者組件成本膨脹究竟是什麼？

So on the second one, it's actual component cost. Like what the supplier's mix of cost is a different thing. I mean, obviously, wafers are going up. But for us, it's just the cost of the component itself.

所以在第二個方面，它是實際的組件成本。就像供應商的成本組合是什麼不同的東西。我的意思是，顯然，晶圓正在上漲。但對我們來說，這只是組件本身的成本。

On your mix question, yes, mix gets better as we go forward because we go more into BiCS5 and more parts of the portfolio. I guess what I'll say is the component impact on the portfolio -- I mean one of the places the component impact on flash is hitting the portfolio is on enterprise HDD, which is...

關於你的混合問題，是的，隨著我們的發展，混合會變得更好，因為我們更多地進入 BiCS5 和更多的產品組合。我想我要說的是組件對產品組合的影響——我的意思是組件對閃存的影響對產品組合的影響之一是企業 HDD，即...

Enterprise SSD.

企業級固態硬盤。

Enterprise SSD. Thank you, Peter. Enterprise SSD. So anyway, the component impact on the portfolio is a -- component shortage impact on the portfolio is part of the equation there as well.

企業級固態硬盤。謝謝你，彼得。企業級固態硬盤。因此，無論如何，組件對投資組合的影響是——組件短缺對投資組合的影響也是其中的一部分。

Our next question will come from Tom O'Malley with Barclays.

我們的下一個問題將來自巴克萊的 Tom O'Malley。

I just had two on the HDD business. One, I think, David, you've talked about seasonality or a more seasonal March. You've obviously seen some marches over the past 2 years that I would classify as less seasonal. Could you remind us what seasonality traditionally looks like in that business?

我在硬盤業務上只有兩個。一，我想，大衛，你談到了季節性或更季節性的三月。在過去的 2 年裡，你顯然已經看到了一些我認為不那麼季節性的遊行。您能否提醒我們傳統上該行業的季節性是怎樣的？

And then the second one is you talked about gross margins over the next 2 quarters, going down 200 to 300 basis points in the HDD business. Could you give us any color on the cadence there? Do you see a sharp falloff in March and a flattening in June? Or is it a step-function for both quarters?

然後第二個是你談到未來兩個季度的毛利率，HDD 業務下降 200 到 300 個基點。你能給我們關於那裡的節奏的任何顏色嗎？您是否看到 3 月急劇下降而 6 月趨於平緩？還是兩個季度的階梯函數？

First question...

第一個問題...

Was on seasonality.

是季節性的。

About 4%, right?

大約4%，對吧？

For the company overall, yes, usually down about 4% in the March quarter.

對公司整體而言，是的，通常在 3 月季度下降約 4%。

And then, Bob, do you want to comment on gross margin, what it looks like in...

然後，鮑勃，你想評論一下毛利率嗎，它在……

HDD.

硬盤。

In HDD fiscal Q3, fiscal Q4?

在 HDD 財政 Q3，財政 Q4？

Yes. Well, as I mentioned, we have 2 big headwinds right now. The one we've had for a while, which are the COVID costs, and we hope they peaked in the December quarter. We think they peaked in the December quarter at about $70 million, and it'll come down some from there.

是的。好吧，正如我所提到的，我們現在有兩大阻力。我們已經有一段時間了，這是 COVID 成本，我們希望它們在 12 月季度達到頂峰。我們認為它們在 12 月季度達到頂峰，約為 7000 萬美元，並且會從那裡下降一些。

The logistics costs have been persistent for quite a while. So I think it really comes down to when we see more passenger traffic coming out of Asia, which will be able to get the cargo rates down. So that's one headwind we continue to have.

物流成本已經持續了很長一段時間。所以我認為這真的歸結為當我們看到更多來自亞洲的客運量時，這將能夠降低貨運費率。所以這是我們繼續面臨的一個不利因素。

And then on the component costs, I mean it's -- we're really expecting those to persist through the fourth quarter. And we expect them to get better as we go through the year, as Dave mentioned, as some of the controllers get on different nodes and we're able to see more supply available. But I think through the fourth quarter, we'll continue to have a challenge.

然後是組件成本，我的意思是——我們真的希望這些成本能夠持續到第四季度。正如 Dave 所說，我們希望它們在這一年中變得更好，因為一些控制器在不同的節點上，我們能夠看到更多的可用供應。但我認為到第四季度，我們將繼續面臨挑戰。

Our next question will come from Jim Suva with Citigroup.

我們的下一個問題將來自花旗集團的 Jim Suva。

Probably a question for Bob. But when you talk about those COVID costs kind of peaking, I think you said December quarter about peaking. Can they come off pretty quickly if the COVID pandemic ends up for spring and summer kind of going away and critical mass of people overcome it? Just kind of curious about how quick they can go away. Or is that too optimistic to think that they could go away, hopefully as fast as warmer temperatures come around?

可能是鮑勃的問題。但是當你談到那些 COVID 成本達到頂峰時，我想你說的是 12 月季度關於達到頂峰。如果 COVID 大流行最終在春季和夏季結束並且大量人克服它，它們能否很快消失？只是有點好奇他們能走多快。或者是過於樂觀以至於認為他們可以離開，希望隨著氣溫升高的速度很快到來？

Yes. I mean I think that -- as I mentioned, the real driver is there's very little passenger traffic coming out of Asia right now. And so there's a lot of cargo on those flights in normal times. So obviously, we're seeing good indications. A lot of the countries are starting to open up and say they're going to open up in the spring. Then you have to see the passenger travel come back and then obviously, you have to negotiate with the carriers and see the rates come down. So I don't know it's going to be super quick, but I think that it will come down over the course of the year.

是的。我的意思是我認為——正如我所提到的，真正的驅動因素是現在來自亞洲的客運量很少。所以在正常情況下，這些航班上有很多貨物。很明顯，我們看到了良好的跡象。許多國家開始開放，並表示將在春季開放。然後你必須看到乘客旅行回來，然後很明顯，你必須與承運人談判並看到費率下降。所以我不知道它會非常快，但我認為它會在一年中下降。

Our next question will come from Steven Fox with Fox Advisors.

我們的下一個問題將來自 Fox Advisors 的 Steven Fox。

Just a basic one from me. I understand how different nodes on the controller side can help, and some things are out of your control in terms of freight costs, as you just mentioned. But I'm just struggling to -- with the idea that in a couple of quarters, you feel that some of these supply chain issues will be more manageable. Is there anything else you guys are doing to control your own destiny that makes it sort of a little bit different in terms of your outlook, say, out into September, December? And Bob, congratulations, and I always appreciate working with you.

只是我的一個基本的。我了解控制器端的不同節點如何提供幫助，正如您剛才提到的，就運費而言，有些事情是您無法控制的。但我只是在努力——在幾個季度內，你會覺得這些供應鏈問題中的一些問題將更易於管理。你們還有什麼其他事情可以控制自己的命運，這讓你們的前景有點不同，比如說，到 9 月，12 月？ Bob，恭喜你，我一直很感激與你合作。

Yes. So I think we're doing everything we can. I mean we're -- I mean we always look to diversify our supply chain, especially in this kind of environment. We're staying very close to our suppliers to understand exactly they understand what we need, and we understand what they can provide. Like I said, there's been more variability in that lately. We're redoubling our efforts there to get close to it.

是的。所以我認為我們正在盡我們所能。我的意思是我們 - 我的意思是我們一直在尋求使我們的供應鏈多樣化，尤其是在這種環境下。我們與供應商保持密切聯繫，以準確了解他們了解我們的需求，我們了解他們可以提供什麼。就像我說的，最近這方面的變化更大。我們正在加倍努力接近它。

And I think when we look -- we plan many, many quarters in the future. And so when we look at where we're at, if we can get the surprises out of there, which we think will get better as more of the nodes in the fab start to free up, we'll be able to be in a better position. And like I said, there are some big issues. When you roll the portfolio forward, you change the bomb of the product, and that gives you a different set of components that you're using. So when you look at that planning is what gives us confidence on the second half.

而且我認為當我們看時 - 我們計劃在未來很多很多季度。因此，當我們看到我們所處的位置時，如果我們能夠從中獲得驚喜，我們認為隨著晶圓廠中更多節點開始騰出，我們會變得更好，我們將能夠處於更好的位置。就像我說的，有一些大問題。當您向前滾動產品組合時，您改變了產品的炸彈，這為您提供了一組不同的組件，您正在使用。因此，當您查看該計劃時，這使我們對下半年充滿信心。

And thanks, Steve. Appreciate your comments.

謝謝，史蒂夫。感謝您的評論。

Our next question will come from Ananda Baruah with Loop Capital.

我們的下一個問題將來自 Loop Capital 的 Ananda Baruah。

Bob, yes, really enjoyed working with you as well.

Bob，是的，真的很喜歡和你一起工作。

Thank you.

謝謝你。

I guess my question is sticking with 20 terabytes. Guys, do the component constraints, do those impede the velocity of the ramp through the year? And I believe in the past, you had talked about maybe reaching kind of 20 TB crossover sometime midyear. And is that still the case?

我想我的問題是堅持 20 TB。伙計們，組件限制是否會阻礙全年的坡道速度？而且我相信在過去，您曾談到可能在年中的某個時候達到 20 TB 的交叉。情況仍然如此嗎？

Yes. The component situation is better on '20, I mean, is maybe a better way of saying what I said earlier. But -- so I mean, at this point, there's no impeding of that road map, right, and that ramp. Where we're running into problems is controllers on 18s because that's where that's where 75% to 80% of the portfolio is right now, and that's the sweet spot of what customers are deploying.

是的。我的意思是，20 年的組件情況更好，這可能是我之前所說的更好的表達方式。但是 - 所以我的意思是，在這一點上，沒有阻礙那個路線圖，對，那個坡道。我們遇到問題的地方是 18 年代的控制器，因為這是目前 75% 到 80% 的產品組合所在的地方，這是客戶部署的最佳點。

So I think as we move through the year and we move into 20, I mean we'll get things to free up. We'll get closer to our suppliers and get more capacity on the current products as well. But as we move forward, we also have some other dynamics that help us.

所以我認為，隨著我們今年進入 20 歲，我的意思是我們會騰出一些東西。我們將更接近我們的供應商，並在當前產品上獲得更多產能。但隨著我們向前發展，我們還有一些其他的動力可以幫助我們。

Our next question will come from Srini Pajjuri with SMBC Nikko Securities.

我們的下一個問題將來自 SMBC Nikko Securities 的 Srini Pajjuri。

Just a follow-up to one of the previous questions on, I guess, the cost side of things. Obviously, some of the costs are transitory when it comes to supply chain. But it's no secret that the semiconductor pricing, IC pricing, has gone up, perhaps on a permanent basis. So I'm just curious, Dave, as you kind of talk to your customers, what sort of conversations are you having with your customers? And I'm trying to understand your ability to pass through some of these permanent cost increases as we go through the next few quarters.

只是對前面一個問題的後續行動，我猜是成本方面的問題。顯然，在供應鏈方面，一些成本是暫時的。但是，半導體定價、IC 定價已經上漲，也許是永久性的上漲，這已經不是什麼秘密了。所以我很好奇，戴夫，當你和你的客戶交談時，你和你的客戶進行了什麼樣的對話？在接下來的幾個季度中，我正在嘗試了解您通過其中一些永久性成本增加的能力。

Yes. So we work -- I mean, I think this goes back to the conversation we had earlier on multi-quarter agreements. I mean we've been working with our customers quite a bit on what their future looks like and what they're planning. That gives us more certainty in the process. And quite frankly, that's helped stabilize pricing in this environment.

是的。所以我們工作 - 我的意思是，我認為這可以追溯到我們之前就多季度協議進行的對話。我的意思是，我們一直在與我們的客戶合作，探討他們的未來是什麼樣子以及他們正在計劃什麼。這讓我們在這個過程中更加確定。坦率地說，這有助於在這種環境下穩定定價。

I mean -- the first order of business is to be as close to our customers and mitigate these costs through staying aligned with them. If it gets to the point where there is -- we think they're going to be long term, then, of course, well, the economics of the industry will have to reset to drive the continued investment to drive the exabyte growth. So it's a little bit of how we're thinking about it right now. It's -- we see them subsiding as the supply chain loosens up and we drive the technology forward. If our calculation is off on that, then we'll look at all the other levers we have in the business.

我的意思是——首要任務是盡可能貼近我們的客戶，並通過與他們保持一致來降低這些成本。如果它達到了存在的地步——我們認為它們將是長期的，那麼，當然，該行業的經濟狀況將不得不重新調整，以推動持續投資以推動艾字節的增長。所以這是我們現在正在考慮的一點點。這是 - 我們看到它們隨著供應鏈的放鬆而消退，我們推動技術向前發展。如果我們的計算不正確，那麼我們將查看我們在業務中擁有的所有其他槓桿。

Got it. And Bob, thank you for all your help, and good luck.

知道了。鮑勃，謝謝你的幫助，祝你好運。

Thank you. Appreciate it, Srini.

謝謝你。欣賞它，斯里尼。

And our final question will come from Nik Todorov with Longbow Research.

我們的最後一個問題將來自 Longbow Research 的 Nik Todorov。

We talked about the LTAs on the HDD side. I wonder what is the appetite from customers for doing LTAs on the NAND side, particularly on the enterprise SSD business and maybe on the client SSD side, as supply is obviously COVID impacted?

我們討論了 HDD 端的 LTA。我想知道客戶對在 NAND 端進行 LTA 的興趣如何，尤其是在企業 SSD 業務上，也許在客戶端 SSD 端，因為供應顯然受到了 COVID 的影響？

I would say -- I mean, definitely LTAs are the routine way the NAND market works with OEMs and anybody that's buying on a consistent basis. So that's been a part of the market for a long time. I think it's -- we're borrowing some of those ideas and moving over to the drive business.

我想說——我的意思是，絕對 LTA 是 NAND 市場與 OEM 和任何持續購買的人合作的常規方式。因此，長期以來，這一直是市場的一部分。我認為是——我們正在藉鑑其中的一些想法並轉向驅動業務。

Again, I talked about earlier why I'm more confident in '22 as we walk into the year and as we go forward. On the NAND side, the percentage of the portfolio under LTAs has gone up as well. I mean when we walked into last year, it was over -- it was already over half of the portfolio. We walk into this year, it's more like 2/3 and realize we have a big percentage of our portfolio in consumer markets in the channel. So those are not things where you think about multi-quarter agreements with your customers.

再一次，我之前談到了為什麼我在進入 22 年和前進的過程中更有信心。在 NAND 方面，LTA 下的投資組合百分比也有所上升。我的意思是當我們進入去年時，它已經結束了——它已經超過了投資組合的一半。我們進入今年，它更像是 2/3，並意識到我們在渠道中的消費市場擁有很大比例的產品組合。因此，您不會考慮與客戶達成多季度協議。

But in the NAND market, it's just the way business is done is to negotiate share for different products with customers and then, of course, on a quarterly basis, negotiate price within that share envelope. And then there's always the opportunity for upsides beyond that share amount. And we're seeing a fair amount of that right now in the NAND business. There's a lot of customers coming to SPC customers, enterprise SSD customers looking for upside in NAND. So that -- again, that makes us optimistic. When we talk about strong demand signals, that's one of them that gives us confidence in the year. We'll manage through the component issues. And we feel super good about where the road map is, where the technology that's underpinning this is. We feel good about the customer relationships and demand signals.

但在 NAND 市場，商業運作的方式就是與客戶協商不同產品的份額，然後當然是每季度在份額範圍內協商價格。然後總有機會超越該份額數量。我們現在在 NAND 業務中看到了相當多的情況。有很多客戶來到 SPC 客戶，企業 SSD 客戶在尋找 NAND 的優勢。所以——再一次，這讓我們感到樂觀。當我們談論強勁的需求信號時，這就是讓我們對今年充滿信心的信號之一。我們將解決組件問題。我們對路線圖的位置以及支撐它的技術感到非常滿意。我們對客戶關係和需求信號感覺良好。

And again, to wrap it all up, we spent 1.5 years getting the company in a much stronger financial position, and we look forward to getting back to a shareholder return policy.

再說一次，總而言之，我們花了 1.5 年的時間讓公司的財務狀況變得更加強大，我們期待著回到股東回報政策。

So -- but again, to summarize your question, LTAs, much, much more prevalent in the NAND business.

所以 - 但是，再次總結您的問題，LTA 在 NAND 業務中更為普遍。

All right. Is that it, Peter?

好的。是這樣嗎，彼得？

Yes.

是的。

All right. Thanks. All right. Look, everyone. We really appreciate you joining us today. We'll be talking throughout the quarter, and we'll look forward to engaging then. Thank you very much.

好的。謝謝。好的。大家看我們非常感謝您今天加入我們。我們將在整個季度進行討論，我們期待屆時參與。非常感謝你。

Thanks, everybody.

謝謝大家。

This concludes today's conference call. Thank you for joining. You may now disconnect.

今天的電話會議到此結束。感謝您的加入。您現在可以斷開連接。