Realtek Semiconductor Corp

TWSE:2379

Earnings Call Transcript 2022-Q3

[Unknown Executive]

Good afternoon, everyone. Welcome to Realtek 2022 Third Quarter Earnings Call. This call will be chaired by Realtek's spokesperson, Yee-Wei Huang. The presentation will be available on the company website before 6:00 p.m. today. At the beginning, our spokesperson will report our third quarter results and give a management's remarks.

After that, we will have a Q&A session. You are welcome to type your questions in the box at the lower right corner on this screen. We will answer the questions accordingly. During the call, you can browse through the pages of the presentation anytime. Now that portion of what presented in this call contain forward-looking statements. Investors are cautioned that forward-looking statements involve risks and uncertainties. Actual results may differ materially from the results forecasted or implied in such statements. Investors should not place undue reliance on such statements.

Now I'll pass this call to our spokesperson, Yee-Wei.

[Yee-Wei Huang, executive]

Thank you. Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen on the line. This is Yee-Wei Huang. You are currently participating in the third quarter 2022 webcast earnings release posted by Realtek Semiconductor Corporation.

Now let's go through the third quarter 2022 operational results. Q3 revenue was TWD 29.8 billion, a small 2.4% Q-o-Q drop and a 2.4% increase compared to the same period last year. The weak PC market is the main reason leading to a Q-o-Q drop. Q3 gross margin was 48.0%, a 12.2 percentage point drop compared to the previous quarter. 2 main reasons for the drop in gross margin in Q3 are, first, change in product mix caused by market downturn, and second, average cost increase.

However, Realtek continues to cooperate with customers to develop a high-value product portfolio. We are confident that the mid- to long-term gross margin -- gross profit margin will be at a level higher than what was seen before the shortage. Q3 operating expense was TWD 10.27 billion or 34.5% of revenue, a 0.5 percentage point drop compared to the previous quarter. We remain confident to leverage our economy of scale to lower our OpEx ratio as the company grows in the long-term.

Q3 operating profit was TWD 4.04 billion or 13.6% of revenue. Lower gross margin was the main reason for a lower operating profit. Q3 non-op income was TWD 354 million, higher interest income from a higher interest -- on a higher interest rate gave rise to a higher non-op income compared to the last quarter.

As a result, Q3 net profit was TWD 4.24 billion or 14.1% of revenue. This leads to Q3 EPS to be TWD 8.20, a slight drop from TWD 9.12 in second quarter. Regarding inventory, Q3 inventory turnover days were at 137 days, a 17-day increase from 120 days last quarter, consistent with what we share in second quarter earnings call.

We do not expect the inventory turnover days to drop in Q4 at Realtek, while we put a priority on supporting the distributors and customers to manage their inventories. However, we are confident that most of these inventories are effective -- excuse me, are effective ones and will be gradually digested. There's no need to worry. This concludes Realtek's third quarter 2022 financial reports.

In summary, the end market demand weakened in the third quarter under the influence of multiple factors, including inflation and geopolitics. In response, the supply chain is adjusting itself to cope with the challenges. This is expected to continue into the fourth quarter, and the operating outlook is cautiously conservative.

Next, we will review the top product lines at Realtek. First, we observed that PC versus non-PC revenue to be approximately TWD 32 million to TWD 38 million in the third quarter. This is a visible drop in PC percentage. On Ethernet, in response to the demand for PC Notebook falling sharply in the third quarter, while the demand for consumer products remain tepid, customers aggressively adjusted their inventory and their stocking principles.

For these reasons, single-port Ethernet controller sales visibly declined in the third quarter. This phenomenon is expected to continue into the fourth quarter. However, we expect the growth momentum of Ethernet chips to recover in 2023, driven by specification upgrades in the PC, PC peripheral and network communication markets. The market readiness manifests itself in the recent announcement of Realtek 2.5 gigabit Ethernet controller with network bandwidth optimization software as the winner of the Taiwan Excellence Award.

On switch, it performed very well in third quarter, partly to make up the supply shortage in first half this year. Forward-looking, the market seems to start feeling the pinch of the strong U.S. dollar and inflation in the fourth quarter. Customer orders may turn conservative in coming quarters. In spite of the short-term pressure, the mid- and long-term prospects of infrastructure buildup remains very positive with strong growth potential in managed switches.

On Wi-Fi, the spec upgrade to Wi-Fi 6 was strong in the third quarter. The Wi-Fi 6 penetration is on track to reach 50% to 60% in PCs and about 50% for routers in 2022. Other than PCs and routers, Realtek Wi-Fi solutions are widely deployed in consumer, broadband, retail, IoT applications. Overall, Realtek Wi-Fi 6 now accounts for roughly 20% of our Wi-Fi business. It is expected to grow strongly in 2023 as Wi-Fi 6 finds its way into many targeted applications served by Realtek.

We expect Wi-Fi 4, Wi-Fi 5 and Wi-Fi 6 will coexist in the foreseeable future and with Wi-Fi 7 adding to the mix in 2024. Our Audio Codec started around April, the PC Notebook shipment drop aggravated in the third quarter. We expect the PC Notebook market to drop 15% to 20% this year compared to 2021 with most of the drop arriving in the second half.

Such a drop has a very direct impact on Realtek Audio Codec and PC-related lines. Forward-looking, we expect PC market to maintain flattish or drop slightly in 2023. Nevertheless, we expect spec upgrade and growing business beyond PC for Realtek Audio Codec Solution. On TV, the overall TV market in 2022 may drop close to 10% compared to last year. Realtek TV business, nonetheless, is still holding steadily as we still have headroom for growth.

[Unknown Executive]

Thank you, Yee-Wei. Now we are entering the Q&A session. [Operator Instructions] Now the first question is from Randy, Credit Suisse. How do you see sales trending for fourth quarter? How is the related performance by application? Do you see a softer area and potential sales decline, inventory correction continuing to the first quarter '23?

[Yee-Wei Huang, executive]

Okay. With high inventory, low demand and very limited visibility, the PC-related market is not expected to perform well in the fourth quarter. The consumer market has been wobbling for over a year and may remain the same in the fourth quarter due to inflation. Although the network communication and automotive markets performed relatively well compared to PC and consumer at the present time, we are observing customers behaving conservatively towards the year-end, given the uncertainty in global economy. We hope that situation may improve next year as the market rebounds.

[Unknown Executive]

Thank you, Yee-Wei. Next question is from Daniel, Morgan Stanley. Any potential impact from the U.S. BIS chip restriction on your China business?

[Yee-Wei Huang, executive]

Okay. We see no immediate impact to Realtek business at this time. As this total 7 BIS rules seem to target a certain very high-performance ICs, super computer products containing such ICs and certain advanced semiconductor manufacturing items, all beyond the scope of Realtek business. We will continue to monitor the situation as more information becomes available to ensure compliance by the company.

[Unknown Executive]

Okay. Thank you, Yee-Wei. The third question is from Daniel, Morgan Stanley. He would like to ask our initial view about 2023. Do we still expect a growth here? And what are the growth drivers in 2023?

[Yee-Wei Huang, executive]

Yes. Despite the short-term headwind, Realtek still expects 2023 to be another growth year in terms of revenue. We see the market continues to demand more connectivity solutions that are faster, lower power, more manageability and easier to use. We expect the growth to come from both spec upgrade and expanded applications, especially in the network communication segment, such as Wi-Fi 6, 2.5 Gig Ethernet, multi-gig Ethernet managed switch and 10G PON. Moving forward, we see audio-video-based man-machine interfaces being the most natural connectivity solution for the connected world that will further fuel the growth of the company.

[Unknown Executive]

Thank you, Yee-Wei. Next question is from [ Nick, Daiwa ]. His question is about pricing. What's your customers' attitude on pricing right now and Realtek's expectation on the product pricing in 2023?

[Yee-Wei Huang, executive]

Yes, customers are requesting price down as we speak or for that matter, as always. At the same time, we have not yet received cost relief from our suppliers. To this end, we are working closely with our customer to manage the price challenge together. For 2023, we still expect the overall ASP to trend upward from new products and spec upgrade.

[Unknown Executive]

Next question is from Kevin, Mizuho, on question related to the gross margin. Kevin would like to ask the gross margin trend in fourth quarter and next year?

[Yee-Wei Huang, executive]

Fourth quarter gross margin is expected to drop some compared to the third quarter level, mainly due to the product mix change. For 2023, we expect the gross margin to fluctuate at a level that is higher than pre-COVID historic range.

[Unknown Executive]

Okay. Next question is from Terence, KGI. Can management give us some hints about the OpEx or the OpEx ratio in 2023? And will there be a chance of headcount freeze due to the market demand slowness?

[Yee-Wei Huang, executive]

Earning for talents, we do not have a headcount freeze, but are always prudent in hiring. We do not expect OpEx ratio to change much in 2023 compared to this year. Nevertheless, lowering the OpEx ratio remains our goal, which we believe to be achievable to leveraging the economy of scale of Realtek growth.

[Unknown Executive]

Next question is from Randy, Credit Suisse. How do you view Realtek's own inventory versus your target and timing to bring it down? How is the customer and channel inventory?

[Yee-Wei Huang, executive]

The inventory now is high within Realtek as well as with our distributors and customers. This may be attributed to at least 2 factors up to second quarter. First is an oversight on the amount of products held on route due to port congestion and container shortage. Second is -- was overbooking during supply shortage. In Q4, we will be focusing on working with our distributors and customers to support their aggressive goal in inventory management. The high in-house inventory is expect to last at least until the end of this year and then start subsiding in 2023. It may take up the first half of 2023 before the inventory returns to a normal level.

[Unknown Executive]

Okay. Next question is from Bruce, Goldman Sachs. He would like to know for our PC market in 2023, we are expecting PC shipment to be flat to slightly down. Any update view on this? If so, what has changed over the past few months?

[Yee-Wei Huang, executive]

Well, barring factors that no one maybe expect, we still believe that PC market will stay flattish or decline slightly in 2023. Longer-term, we expect the PC market to return to a normal refresh cycle with expanded applications.

[Unknown Executive]

Next question is from [ Sunny ], UBS. She would like to ask, have you seen any foundry began to reduce foundry pricing? And during the chip shortage, you qualified new foundry and fab sources allegedly some in China. And now given the end demand moderation, would you consider moving back the production to Taiwan, the primary foundry supplier?

[Yee-Wei Huang, executive]

Well, at this point, we have not seen foundries offering price reductions in spite of the expectation of the market and customers. With an expanded supplier base now, Realtek will choose the best qualified fabs for new product introduction and wafer allocations based on their specialty area, quality, reliability, use and, of course, price.

[Unknown Executive]

Okay. Thank you, Yee-Wei. And next question is from Aaron, Nomura. What's the supply and demand gap for networking products? And for what percentage could this segment compensate the loss and downside from the PC space?

[Yee-Wei Huang, executive]

The PC market made a dramatic turn from supply shortage to oversupply when entering the third quarter. We have seen PC customers lowering their 12-month rolling forecast in each of their twice-a-month update since late second quarter. At the present time, it may be still premature to ascertain if the PC forecast reduction has bottomed out. To this end, suffice it to say, the drop in the PC market in the second half of 2022 has outstripped the strength of the communication network business. It is worth noting that we are observing many customers behaving conservatively towards the year-end, given the uncertainty in global economy.

[Unknown Executive]

Next question is from Terence, KGI. He would like to know the Wi-Fi 4, Wi-Fi 5, Wi-Fi 6 ASP and the Wi-Fi 7 development progress? And does the Wi-Fi penetration rate forecast for router and PC has negatively impacted by the weakening demand?

[Yee-Wei Huang, executive]

Okay. The relative ASPs among Wi-Fi 4, 5 and 6 in the third quarter are around 1 to 2.5 to 4, signifying a shrinking gap between Wi-Fi 4 and Wi-Fi 5, but still roughly at 60% premium for Wi-Fi 6 over Wi-Fi 5. The ASP differences among different technologies imply that they may coexist for some time.

Regardless of the ASP gap, the upgrade to Wi-Fi 6 is unstoppable as far as we can see. Case-in-point, Realtek just launched its fifth-generation Ameba E series IoT solution, featuring Wi-Fi 6 and smart voice. And that will allow smart devices to have the ability to perceive, interact and determine actions to take. Regarding Wi-Fi 7, the Plugfest is ongoing and they last until mid-2023. Realtek is among the first batch of Wi-Fi 7 providers in the Plugfest. We will timely release our Wi-Fi 7 products to meet the market needs.

[Unknown Executive]

Thank you, Yee-Wei. And next question is still Wi-Fi related. Jason from CLSA would like to ask seeing other players are aggressively migrating to Wi-Fi 6, can we expect the Realtek market share in Wi-Fi 5 market?

[Yee-Wei Huang, executive]

Sure. Edging to Wi-Fi 4, Wi-Fi 5 is expected to have a long tail. During the downturn, the demand for Wi-Fi 5 tends to pick up because of its cost advantage, as Realtek strives for maintaining a complete Wi-Fi portfolio, including Wi-Fi 5. We will continue to win customers with Wi-Fi 5 solutions with unparalleled cost performance.

[Unknown Executive]

Next question is from Sunny, UBS. And she would like to ask on our Ethernet and Switch business, what are the drivers to manage switches and 2.5 Gig Ethernet?

[Yee-Wei Huang, executive]

Well, with 5G driving anytime, anywhere wireless connectivity, delivering up to 20 gigabit per second peak data rates, it has become clear requirement for the Ethernet LAN-based connectivity, including single-port Ethernet controllers, files and multi-port Ethernet switches to go beyond gigabit per second per port. This way the LAN-based wireless connectivity solutions do not become the bottleneck in the connected world. Furthermore, the network traffic with increasing complexity and throughput are demanding switches to provide more manageability and intelligence thereby fueling the growth of both 2.5 Gig Ethernet and managed switches.

[Unknown Executive]

Thank you, Yee-Wei. And next question is from Sunny, UBS. She would like to ask about the competition in China. Do you see the competition in margin for Wi-Fi 4 and Wi-Fi 5, Bluetooth and Ethernet, et cetera, in China, how about Wi-Fi 6?

[Yee-Wei Huang, executive]

Well, as a provider of connectivity solutions that support international standards, we have always faces competition from many directions, including both from China. Up to now, nevertheless, we have not seen a competitor from China or elsewhere that has a Wi-Fi, Bluetooth or Ethernet solution portfolio that is as complete as what Realtek offers. We acknowledge the incessant rise and other times force our competitors from China, but there's nothing we cannot manage.

[Unknown Executive]

Thank you, Yee-Wei. And next question is from William, JPMorgan. He would like to know about the auto marketing business. Could you update the current auto Ethernet penetration rate, number of Ethernet port adoption per vehicle and competition landscape change? And for Realtek, please comment on your revenue contribution targets, order backlog and customers, as well as the market share?

[Yee-Wei Huang, executive]

Automotive Ethernet is growing steadily among carmakers and their Tier 1s. We estimate for 2025, 2026 new car models well over 50% of them will adopt automotive Ethernet to a varying degree. And entry-level model may have only 1 Ethernet switch and less than 10 Ethernet ports. A high-end often electric vehicle may have multiple Ethernet switches and over 50 Ethernet ports.

In addition to Realtek, the major suppliers of automotive Ethernet solution include the familiar names of Broadcom and Marvell. The competition will focus on full range of speeds ranging from 10 megabit per second to 10 gigabit per second, high-speed SSI interface, time-sensitive network features, safety and security. Suffice it to say that Realtek is as competitive as other major suppliers. We expect continuing growth in our auto Ethernet product lines in the coming years.

[Unknown Executive]

Thank you, Yee-Wei. Next question is from Daniel, Morgan Stanley. Could you share your view on the bidding market in China, for example, the set-top box and PON? Do you think that it's sustainable into 2023?

[Yee-Wei Huang, executive]

China, new telco tender projects slowed down for the time period leading to the 2020 Congress in China. One reason was the difficulty for the broadband infrastructure deployment under the zero-COVID policy. Nevertheless, people are expecting that the tender projects will pick up the pace again after the party Congress ends. We should pay close attention to the development. Overall, we believe the telco tender project in China will maintain its strength at roughly the same level between 2022 and 2023. Mainly, set-top box annual TAM will be TWD 30 million to TWD 50 million, PON will be TWD 70 million to TWD 80 million and routers, TWD 60 million to TWD 70 million.

[Unknown Executive]

Okay. Thank you, Yee-Wei. And next question is from Sunny, UBS. We understand that the TWS market is still weak, but would you be able to share with us the strategy and the focus of the Bluetooth? And how should we think about Bluetooth and the wearable market growth outside China versus within China?

[Yee-Wei Huang, executive]

Yes. Realtek remains committed to the Bluetooth TWS solution. Nevertheless, we are staying away from the basic TWS market competing solely on price. We are focusing on global brand customers, gaming applications and the new BLE audio applications. We are also combining wearable and TWS into a 2-in-1 solution to provide a double, dual-mode wearable solution, namely, BLE Data plus BT Classic Audio and also BLE Classic Audio plus BLE Audio. As BLE Audio becomes commonplace in the near future, Realtek will help customers enjoy time-to-market benefit for BLE Audio Watch, TWS and various related applications.

[Unknown Executive]

Thank you, Yee-Wei. And next question is from Terence, KGI. He would like to know what's our focus application for the USB 4 and the PCIe 5.0? Could Realtek give us your initial sales contribution target in 2023 and 2024 for those products?

[Yee-Wei Huang, executive]

Okay. USB 4 is markedly different from the early version of USB, in that, you can share a single high-speed link with multiple data types used in PC-oriented application, including USB 3.2, Thunderbolt 3.0, DisplayPort 1.4, and PCIe3. It is worth noting that USB-IF just announced on October 18, the latest specification for USB 4 Version 2.0, doubling the bandwidth to 80 gigabit per second. Almost in lockstep, VESA announced DisplayPort 2.1, and Intel shared the first teaser of next-generation Thunderbolt, both supporting 80 gigabit per second USB Version 2.0.

As noted USB 4, DisplayPort, Thunderbolt, and for that matter, PCIe are all PC-oriented high-speed connectivity solutions. To this end, it is not hard to expect the first wave of applications for USB 4 and PCIe 5.0, may include PC peripherals, such as high-end displays, storage devices and USB Hubs.

Realtek USB 4 and PCIe 5.0 solutions are under development. The first full feature USB 4 Hub featuring Realtek solution will be ready in the second half of 2023. Realtek PCe -- PCIe 5.0 will be ready in 2023. We prefer not discussing the revenue goals for individual products.

[Unknown Executive]

Thank you, Yee-Wei. And the next question is from Michael Wong, Polymer. He would like to know about the fourth quarter and the first quarter gross profit margin outlook? And will inventory write-offs or the gross margins more than the company expected for the inventory every 3 months we need to write off them? And what mix of inventory and networking versus the PC?

[Yee-Wei Huang, executive]

3 months is pretty short. We do not write off inventory that fast. So we expect 4Q margin -- gross margin, we say we expect that to be lower than third quarter, mainly due to product mix change. And the impact of gross margin -- the impact of inventory write-off on gross margin, we said it may come later, but it wouldn't be a significant impact. So in terms of the mix of inventory at the present time, we do observe higher percentage in PC as opposed to networking.

[Unknown Executive]

Okay. Thank you, Yee-Wei. And next question is from [indiscernible]. Can you also talk about the ASP declining trend for the networking? Do you see acceleration of the ASP declines?

[Yee-Wei Huang, executive]

Yes. Well, there's definitely ASP pressure in the market today. So short-term, there will be, we do expect short-term ASP decline. Longer-term, as we explained, the spec upgrade is unstoppable. So longer-term, for example, next year, we actually still believe Realtek ASP will trend upward because of the spec upgrade and product mix.

[Unknown Executive]

Thank you, Yee-Wei. There's no further questions, and we will conclude the meeting now. Thank you for your participation today. Please feel free to contact our IR team if you have further questions after the meeting. The replay will be available on the IR page of the company website before 6:00 p.m. And thank you. Have a good day.