Tokyo Electron Limited (8035) Q1 2027 Earnings Call Transcript

It's time for us to start Tokyo Electron Finance Announcement for the first quarter of fiscal year ending March 2027. Thank you very much for joining us today despite your busy schedule. I am Yatsuda of IR Department serving as a moderator of today's session. I'd like to introduce our today's attendees, Toshiki Kawai, Representative Director, President and CEO. Oh, Hiroshi Kawamoto, Senior Vice President, General Manager, CFO, Division Office of Finance Division. First of all, Kawai will present the status related to the earthquake which occurred in Kumamoto around 4.27pm on July 28th and impacts of subsequent aftershocks. Once again, this is Kawai. I would like to express my deepest sympathy to the people affected by the earthquake which occurred with epicenter at Kumamoto Region in Kumamoto Prefecture and I sincerely pray for earliest possible restoration of the affected area. Our company has developed manufacturing sites of Kota developer, cleaning system and bonding system in Kosi City, Kumamoto Prefecture. Yesterday, on July 29th, we closed the sites and assessed their status. And we have confirmed all employees in Kumamoto, including temporary and contract workers, are safe. Some of the employees' family members got injured. But fortunately, we have confirmed they are not in serious condition. For manufacturing facilities and equipment, we identified water leakage in some locations, but there has been no damage identified to the buildings. Our partner company is manufacturing our equipment. Two companies located close to the epicenter are temporarily suspending their operations to adjust machinery equipment, but the other partner companies have already resumed their operation. For suppliers so far, serious damage has not been identified. We need to be prepared for aftershocks, but as of today, we believe we can return back to full operation early next week, and impacts on our business performance are minor. Our product manufactured outside Kumamoto, including H-system, deposition systems, and probers, as well as the relevant suppliers, are not affected. This is current status related to Kumamoto earthquake, We will keep paying close attention to safety and strive for early restoration. Now we will move on to the presentations on first quarter of the fiscal year ending March 2027. Before starting the presentations, let me explain the flow of today's session. First of all, Kawamoto and Kawai will make presentations. After that, until 6.30pm Japan time, we will have a question and answer session where we entertain questions from the audience. This meeting uses two channels of WebEx for simultaneous interpretation between Japanese and English. As we explained in our email, you are kindly requested to use apps on PCs or mobile terminals if you wish to ask questions. But if you are not going to ask questions, you can use your telephones. Since this conference is intended for institutional investors and analysts, we would appreciate your understanding that we receive questions only from institutional investors and analysts, as usual. We will post the audio contents of this conference in Japanese and English on our website within a couple of days. It will be appreciated if you could also visit our website. Now, Mr. Kawamoto will present the Consolidated Financial Summary. Kawamoto-san, please. Good afternoon. I am Kawamoto of Finance Division. I'd like to present the consolidated financial summary of the first quarter of fiscal year ending March 2027. This slide shows quarterly financial summary. I will mainly refer to the figures in the blue box. In the first quarter, we generated net sales of 732.3 billion yen, 2.9% increase quarter over quarter, reflecting our customers' positive attitude toward investment. Accordingly, gross profit was 342.7 billion yen, 2.9% rise from the previous quarter. Both net sales and gross profit hit record high. Gross profit margin was 46.8%, remaining flat from the previous quarter. Operating income was 211.4 billion yen, increasing by 2.8% sequentially. Operating profit margin was 28.9%, almost unchanged from the previous quarter. Net income attributable to owners of the parent dropped by 23.3% from the previous quarter to 164.3 billion yen. This is because, in the previous quarter, extraordinary income by selling strategic shareholdings was included. This is a graphic representation of the financial summary shown on the previous page on the chronological basis for your reference This slide shows net sales by region Sales in Taiwan increased by 18.9% sequentially and its proportion went up to 25.4% Proportion to sales in China on the bottom was 30.4% 3.6 percentage point increase quarter over quarter. On fiscal 2027 four-year basis, proportion of sales in China is expected to be the low 30% level. This shows SBE new equipment sales by application. In the first quarter, from the top of this chart, sales to DRAM customers accounted for 32%, non-volatile memory customers accounted for 11%, and non-memory accounted for 57%. SAP new equipment sales were strong, just as in the previous quarter. In particular, sales to non-volatile memory customers increased by 32% quarter over quarter. This slide shows the fuel solution sales. In the first quarter, fuel solution sales increased by 15.5% sequentially to 188.0 billion yen. Customers' fab utilization remains at the high level And parts and service sales grew by 13.7% from the previous quarter Used equipment and modifications Including modifications from productivity enhancement Showed particularly high growth rate of 20.5% from the previous quarter This shows the balance sheet Total assets were 2,955,4 billion yen cash and cash equivalents were 409.6 billion yen decreasing by 96.6 billion yen from the previous quarter mainly due to dividend payment to our shareholders and tax payment notes and accounts receivables were 544.0 billion yen increasing by 18.1 billion yen quarter of a quarter Inventories were 751.5 billion yen, increasing by 38.4 billion yen from the previous quarter Although inventories increased slightly, inventory turnover showed improvement Tangible assets were 610.3 billion yen, increasing by 21.0 billion yen from the previous quarter For liabilities and net assets shown on the right-hand side, liabilities were 812.5 billion yen, increasing by 21.5 billion yen quarter-over-quarter. Net assets were 2.142.9 billion yen, rising by 72.9 billion yen sequentially. This slide shows the cash flow. Cash inflow from operating activities in the first quarter was 118.7 billion yen The cash outflow from investing activities was 38.1 billion yen The cash outflow from financing activities was 117.4 billion yen primarily due to development payment Free cash flow was plus 80.5 billion yen This concludes my presentation. Thank you very much. Now, Kawaii will give you the presentation on business environment and financial estimates. Kawaii-san, please. Once again, this is Kawaii. I will present business environment and financial estimates. Let me start with business environment. The WFE market outlook has been updated from April projection to $150 billion or more in CY2026 and $190 billion or more in calendar 2027. In both years, we expect 20% or more year-over-year growth. As shown in the diagram, sales for AI data center applications drive the WFE market. In five years from calendar 2023, which is inaugural year of AI, through calendar 2027, sales to AI data center are expected to grow by five times or more. AI data centers need a broad range of devices, not only GPU and HPM, but also DDR, CPU, and 3D NAND. and investment plans for advanced devices are accelerating. This slide shows AI evolution and semiconductor technology trend. AI is evolving from current generative AI to full-fledged implementation of agentic AI and physical AI. For CPU and GPU, device scaling keeps going farther from current mainstream node of 3 nanometer, while backside PDN will be adapted to enhance power efficiency. DRAM is evolving from one C node to one D node. For HBM, the number of stacked DRAMs will increase from 12 to 16. NAND will be evolving to 300 layers and farther to 400 layers. These drastic technology innovations will be realized just within two years to come. Conventionally, the fab space limitation was regarded as a bottleneck. To overcome this challenge, quite a few large-scale fabs to manufacture leading-edge semiconductors are now being constructed. This slide shows our mid-term management plan that we produced back in 2022. We are working to achieve the goals for net sales of 3 trillion yen or more, upper and profit margin of 35% or more and ROE of 30% or more by the end of this fiscal year. For net sales, our outlook for the first half of this fiscal year exceeds 1.6 trillion yen and we received stronger inquiries from the second half. We are getting more confident to achieve 3 trillion yen or more. Also for ROE, we can accept 30% or more because of net income increase and capital efficiency improvement. Meanwhile, our business environment is changing more significantly than before. Expo control triggered by U.S.-China trade conflicts, tariffs, geopolitical impacts such as Middle East conflicts and prolongs Russia-Ukraine war, global spread inflation and exchange rate fluctuation and changes in customers' investment plans, these emerging developments were not expected when we set up the mid-term management plan. These changes in our business environment makes it challenging to achieve the goal of operating profit margin. For operating income, however, we are getting closer to achieve 1 trillion yen through our steady ongoing efforts. In order to achieve the goals of mid-term management plan and pursue higher level, it's critical to explore and enhance our earning power and corporate changes in the market appropriately. We will launch high-value added new models and upgrades in a timely manner. At the same time, we will enhance services by leveraging AI and robotics so that we can contribute to the improvement of yield and equipment uptime ratio in our customers' farms. Ipsida, that we announced in December 2025, is our digital infrastructure to raise field productivity. activity. As we announced expansion of collaboration with NVIDIA this month, we are going to promote development of solutions for agentic AI and robotics. As there are many plans for construction of large-scale fabs in order to address scarcity of resources, it becomes critical to improve efficiency and reduce time of equipment startup activities. We are exploring ways to further speed up equipment startup activities, even from the equipment design phase, including introduction of automation. In addition, we will optimize pricing to address falling costs triggered by recent reinflation. By working on these initiatives, we strive to drastically improve profit margin and aim to achieve gross profit margin of 50% or more within around two years to come. This slide shows our progress and business opportunities identified through the initiatives I described. Let me start with business progress in fiscal 2027, this fiscal year. As presented in the previous financial announcement, quarter developer, etching system, and advanced packaging are driving our sales growth in this fiscal year. For Quota Developer, our new product, Lithium Pro Dice, has been successfully adopted by customers, and we won PORs in multiple processes in Advanced Logic and DRAM. The four-year sales of each system of 1 trillion yen are coming within our reach. Regarding HARC-H for advanced DRAM, we are moving ahead steadily to win PORs of new models For advanced packaging, profile sales show an outstanding growth and four-year sales are likely to go significantly beyond 100 billion yen Evaluation of new model equipped with more sophisticated heat absorption technology is progressing well Next, I will talk about future business opportunities. These highlights include what I present in previous financial announcements. For H-System, cryogenic H-System with 400 layers will start to be deployed in customers' mass production line from calendar 2027. Seven, we have won POR for our new low-resistance metal deposition system, which is expected to make contribution to our sales in new application area for bonder laser-related system. We have both leading-edge front-end process technologies and bonding technology internally, where we'll contribute to address challenges in critical bonding process of various devices. With regard to edge system from DRAM interconnect process, which we are strong, along with rapid increase of DRAM investment, our five-year cumulative sales to fiscal 2030 are getting closer to 1 trillion yen, significantly exceeding our original guidance of 500 billion yen. We launched Plexa SDP Device Prover for Advanced Logik in April. We are going to fulfill high level of customer expectations in advancing test processes. Next, I will present the financial estimates. With a backdrop of strong demand for AI servers, currently we are receiving pull-in requests for delivery and additional orders from our customers. Reflecting our financial results of the first quarter and recent market dynamics we have made upward revision to the financial estimate for the first half of this fiscal year with net sales of 1,620,000,000 Yen gross profit of 748,000,000 Yen and operating income of 458,000,000 Yen and all of which are our half-year record For the second half of fiscal 2027, we expect another wave of acceleration in demand growth. Shipment will increase furthermore, especially for memory and advanced logic applications, and we expect powerful growth of momentum stronger than that in the first half of this fiscal year. For impacts of geopolitical context such as Middle East situation and supply chain status, There are not any issues to be noted at present, but it will closely monitor the situation and take appropriate actions. This slide shows fiscal 2027 SBE new equipment sales forecast. New equipment sales in the first half of fiscal year are expected to grow by 45% year-over-year to 1,240,000,000 yen. The breakdown by application is shown on the slide. Driven by AI server demand, sales of a system for high-end devices are expected to increase. The new equipment sales in the second quarter are expected to hit quarterly record, topping 700 billion yen. This slide shows our plan for R&D expenses and capex. there are no changes here in fiscal 2027 we plan four-year r&d expenses of 330 billion yen we will actively promote r&d to enhance foundation of a technology competitive edge and support semiconductor technological innovation for capex we plan to spend 190 20 billion yen on the four-year basis capex is mainly composed of acquisition machines for the development buildings with whose construction was completed in previous fiscal year as well as construction of new miyagi innovative production center to be completed next summer as a smart fab where we'll utilize robust infrastructure shown on this slide capitalize on future business opportunities to maximize our corporate value. Next, I will present the dividend forecast. Following the upward revision of fiscal 2027 first half financial estimate, FY2027 interim dividend is expected to be 384 yen per share. This is also expected to be record high. The share repurchase is proceeding as shown here, in line with the program of up to 150 billion yen decided in the Board of Directors meeting on May 29, 2026, where we'll conduct appropriate balance sheet management. As for stock split, we announced together with share repurchase, where we'll split each share of common stock into five shares, with record date of September 30, 2026. By lowering minimum investment, we will make our shareholders more affordable for investors to expand the investor base. Finally, I will present the new management structure commencing July 1, 2026. Towards sustainable growth and corporate value enhancement of Tokyo Electron, we have established the structure to ensure to promote our growth strategy. The seven corporate officers shown here are going to swiftly work on business management as the top executive team. We have newly established COO to power up both of the two wheels, namely strategy development and its implementation. COO is responsible for developing mid-term management plan and further ahead growth strategies, raising corporate value. what COO is responsible for overseeing business operations and execution based on the strategies to ensure the implementation. In addition, we will clearly define person in charge of execution of each function business domain such as CFO in charge of finance to enhance velocity and effectiveness of management execution. I would deeply appreciate your continued support. This concludes my presentation. Thank you very much for your kind attention. We will have question and answer session until 6.30 Japan time. You can ask questions either in Japanese or English, but our speakers are on Japanese channel. Please allow us to take audio questions only in Japanese. If you ask a question in Japanese, please click the raise hand button on Webex. For details, please refer to the instructions attached to the invitation email. I will call the name of the person one by one. Our secretariat will contact you in advance, so please check the Webex chat box. For questioning English, please use Webex chat box and give your affiliation name and question in text. Send it to our secretariat. We will refrain from answering questions if your name and affiliation are not given. We will translate your English question and on the Japanese channel. I will read it out in Japanese, and speakers will answer in Japanese. On English channel, the questions answer simultaneously interpreted into English on the real-time basis. As we like to take questions from as many participants as possible, we'll take one question per question. So first question is Yoshida-san from CSCSA Securities. Thank you very much. on slide 12 I would like to ask a question regarding WFE market so outlook this year and next year so $150 billion more $190 billion or more when you look at the growth rate if you have any figure for growth rate I'd like to see that on the base of fiscal year what sort of context slide 70 you can see drastic growth toward the second half of this fiscal year but toward second year from the first half of this year. What sort of plan do you have? So I want to get some comments for calendar year basis and also fiscal year basis. The first of all, regarding the proportion by application, a breakdown by application, that's what you asked. So last year, proportion was 65% for logic, foundry. and memory was 35%. This year, memory growth is rather drastic. Therefore, logic accounts for 60% and memory accounts for about 40%. That's the current status this year. So for three months, so the difference between fiscal and calendar year, there is no highlights. The agentic AI inquiry is really strong. Agentic AI is a driver, and HBM, NAND, not only GPU, but also CPU applications are now spreading. So by and large, agentic AI is driving the overall WP market, Therefore, leading-edge area is driving the WFV market. Thank you very much. For memory, could you give us some proportion between DRAM and NAND? And if you have any difference in competition this year and next year, could you let us know about the difference? So $150 billion or more for this year. That's what I set for DRAM, low $40 billion range. NAND, low to mid $10 billion range. Logic and Foundry, mid $80 billion range. And factory automation and welfare-level packaging, about $10 billion. So this is the composition of $150 billion. So memory and logic foundry composition. So year-on-year growth rate is for DRAM, plus 30% or more. And NAND is plus 40% or more. Logic foundry, plus 15% or more. So that's the breakdown for growth rate. CY26 and 27, about 20% growth is expected from 26 to 27. But so there is no major change in proportion among different applications. Thank you very much for a very thorough answer. Next question is Chikanai-san from J.P. Morgan. Chikanai-san I want to understand the price issue so could you give us some update over the past three months so from second half this year can you see some contribution and demand is rather strong so the gross profit margin of 50 percent is it possible for you to achieve that target a bit earlier than expected that's what I I think, so could you share your idea with us, please? For the price revision, we are very thorough, especially we are explaining to the customer about impact of inflation very thoroughly. And so we need to enhance the capacity further more from the max capacity because of the demand increase. and we are getting support from supplier and resources and we need to have some investment costs as well. So that's what we are explaining to our customers and pricing negotiations should reflect the current market status and little by little, customers are understanding the importance of those factors. so the maybe effects can be seen in the second half of this year maybe in the fourth quarter of this fiscal year I think we can see the considerable impacts in the fourth quarter of this fiscal year as for the gross profit margin I said 50% or more about your question yes what you say is almost collect, early stage of next fiscal year, I think we can achieve the level of our target. Thank you very much. One further question about the price revision. So Apple to Apple, do you also proceeding with price revision as well? The price revision or pass on costs to the price along with inflation for the existing models? Yes, we are giving very thorough explanations to the customers and the customers are recognizing the needs of the appliance optimization little by little. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Shikanai-san, thank you very much for your question. Next question is from Mr. Wadaki from SBI Securities. This is Wadaki, thank you very much. regarding WFE outlook. So you are rather bearish. So you said earlier, first half, the new plus 40% for the new equipment sales. I think that's close to my understanding. So WFE market is rather conservative because you cannot catch up with the demand or second half of this fiscal year. maybe if you say something true, we will be surprised. I think at present WFE market is getting much stronger. What is your take on this? So $150 billion or more, that's what I said, because there is sufficient growth potential in the market. When you look at global situation, this is global WFE market outlook that I said earlier so whether the capacity can catch up with the demand when you think about maybe 150 billion or more should be the appropriate way to express the outlook of the WFE market next year 190 billion dollars or more so at least 190 billion dollars in calendar 2027. That's how we view the market trend. I understand the consensus among analysts, which is $200 billion. And we don't have any disagreement about that. However, but there are the distribution or capacity, not only our company, but when you look at WFE on the global basis, this $150 billion or more for this year and $190 billion or more. I think this is rather appropriate outlook of the Rave market. One further question. Now China is accelerating the market furthermore. You can see the upward revision in the Chinese market. How do you think about it? Yes, that's possible. Thank you very much. I learned a lot from you. Radakistan, thank you very much for your question. Next question is from Shibano-san from Citigroup Global Market Japan. I have Shibano from Citigroup Global Market Japan. I have a question regarding capacity. Kawai-san said $150 billion or more, $190 billion or more. You understand the analyst does have a much higher outlook for WFE market and you recognize that. For example, 2027. is that rather than 190 billion or more, close to 250, or 2028, close to 300 billion, if that is required by the market, so maybe two years from now or three years from now, if the chipmega gives the appropriate forecast, so do you think it's possible for Tokyo Electron to address such kind of demand increase toward the future? so market is getting very very strong not only demand as we said in our presentation the logic so three nanometer is mainstream but the logic node will shift to two nanometer node as well and 3d NAND 300 layers to 400 layers as well, DDR, one C node to one D node transition will be taking place. Agentic AI is now driving the demand for CPU for higher computing capability. looking further ahead high performance computing will come and current big computing neuron and quantum computing all those things will be supported by communication higher speed communication so those things will be happening within 10 years to come so the rapid acceleration will take place in our company two years, about two years roadmap or investment plan from customers, we do have some consensus with customers where a customer gives us some information based on our partnership with our customers so that we can share two-year investment plan together and we do try to secure the capability to address or fulfill the customers demand by looking at this kind of customer plan so within japan we do have the supply chain cluster that's our strength and two years ever since two years ago we have been steadily preparing for the capacity and enhancement based on the long-term investment plan or focused in Five years and 10 years from now, the very strong growth is expected, as you said. The very rapid growth is expected. On the other hand, we must be very careful. So hyperscaler, for example, are now investing large amount of money in cash flow and also energy balance need to be considered as well. so if you ask us we can we do have the capacity to the largest number of the outlook but within two-year forecast we are trying to get closer to the customers demand so we try to have high responsive capability that's our strengths so that we can fulfill the demand of the customers and we talked about long-term issue, high performance computing, the semiconductor growth, and we need to enhance the capacity for that purpose. As I said in my presentation, in particular in Miyagi, we are now constructing smart fab. Delivered productivity should be enhanced and our employees It's work-life balance should be improved as well. So cost reduction and work-life balance enhancement, all those things are pursued at the same time. Thank you very much. If possible, Miyagi new production building, before it becomes in operation, how much can you provide the equipment for WFE base? When the new production building is completed, What is the ultimate goal or capacity you can achieve? Do you have any fear that we can use as a benchmark? Ultimately, the timing is to be pulled forward. Furthermore, in Miyagi, we have the Innovative Production Center. If it's become an operation, our capacity can be increased by three times. the speed we thought we have a bit longer time span, 20, 30 or later but we need to accelerate our capacity expansion to address the rapid market growth but you said three times more capacity we do have method already established therefore to meet market demand increase, we need to accelerate the timing to achieve three times more capacity. Thank you very much. That was very clear. Thank you very much. Shibano-san, thank you very much for your question. Next question is from Shimamoto-san of Okasan Securities. Shimamoto-san, please. I am Shimamoto from Okasan Securities. I have a question regarding optimization of pricing You said there are some impacts or effects from fourth quarter. But what's the percentage of increase in pricing from the conventional current price? So tell the Tokyo election is very competitive. And your competitive edge is very, very high. When as suppliers, costs have been increased by 10%. If that is the case, price optimization by 20% or 30% might be achievable. Could you share your idea with us, please? I'm sorry. The percentage of price optimization. So, actually, we are talking with multiple customers in parallel. I'm very sorry, but let me refrain from answering to that question. I'm sorry for that. I understand. So just one clarification, WFE market for next year is presented at least 20% more. So as for Tokyo Electron business performance next fiscal year, so WFE plus deploys optimization. So that will be rather increase in your income or revenue. Is that correct understanding? this top line, yes, we can achieve that level of top line. We haven't made any external announcement, but we can expect high level of growth next fiscal year. Regarding the profit margin is to be improved. So that, together with the provision of higher value to the customers, and as I said earlier, on the materials, page 15 there are five initiatives I explain I would like to give you some explanation so not only achieve mid-term management plan we need to do more than that so in every aspect of five items we want to pursue together with technology innovation we are going to provide new models to the market and we will take actions to enhance the yield and productivity should be improved by taking care of inflation by doing all the things we try to improve our profit margin so there are five initiatives shown on page 15 so this is more than the midterm management plan so this is how I'd like you to understand this page. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Shimamoto-san, thank you very much for your question. Next question is from Tamura-san from Morgan Stanley MUFG Research. I am Tamura from Morgan Stanley. Thank you very much. I have a question regarding operating profit margin. In your presentation, $1 trillion operating income is within your reach. That's what you said. Let me just get confirmation. Do you think it's achievable within this fiscal year or after this year? And short-time question. So second quarter, operating profit margin. so when you think about the first half plan maybe there's been some decline expected for operating profit margin in the second quarter so R&D and depreciations are shown over here are there any other factors which brings down the operating profit margin in the second quarter or are there any some potential upside factors as well your first question $1 trillion operating income is expected within this fiscal year. For your second question, the second quarter, Kawamoto will give you the present explanation. Thank you very much for your question. This is Kawamoto. As you pointed out, when you calculate second quarter, the operating profit margin declines slightly according to these figures. you said R&D expenses in addition to R&D expenses the labor costs in July we conducted the salary increase and we also have the bonus so we are getting higher profit and product mix is another factor so we are going to try to exceed the figure I presented today thank you very much quarter by quarter there are some changes or difference for example the timing of startup or the main system cells so we need to consider this kind of mix so sometimes figures we need to revisit figures from time to time because of those reasons, but overall profit margin is expected to grow. So price revision or upgrades of our system and also the fixed cost against the sales will be reducing because of the strong demand. That also contributes the improvement of profit margin. When you look at quarterly basis, the sales category limits might have some impacts on quarter-based figures. Thank you very much. I have one follow-up question. So now you showed $150 billion to $190 billion next year. So the 27% growth rate, almost 30% growth rate from this year to next year. So your top line increases accordingly. so this is the final year of mid-term management plan your target for OPM margin is 35% I think you can achieve 35% of operating profit margin next fiscal year so new mid-term management plan will start maybe next year but original plan of OPM 35% how much more can you expect from next fiscal year and onward? Could you give us some comments? 35%. We are just talking about what's happening right now. We do have much larger growth potential. So we try to exceed that level of operating profit margin. So growth of existing business and enhancement of efficiency and also some expansion. So in our case, we do have plasma technology and also we have the very good thermal control technology, also pressure control, chemical control technology. We do have those technologies internally. Bonding, bonders, die-to-wefer, total solution is to be provided. So existing business, some expansion, and market growth. When you think about those factors, maybe as for the profit margin, we are trying to pursue world-class profit margin. I'm sorry, I tried to avoid to give you the quantitative answer, but sorry for that. I've accepted a lot for next fiscal year in one word. Tamara-san, thank you very much for your question. We have about 10 minutes left, but there are so many people try to ask questions. The next question is Nakamura-san from Goldman Sachs, Japan. I am Nakamura. WFE market outlook and your sales outlook, when I compare those two, so this fiscal year, your sales really outperformed WFE market. So next year, 190 billion or more. I think it grows very rapidly. Your sales, in order for me to understand your potential sales next fiscal year. So, what is the driver of the further growth of the WFA market? The first one is quota developer. As for quota developer, we have share of more than 90%. So all lithography systems, covering from EUV lithography to immersion lithography. For those investments, our company's quota developer are installed with a level of 90% of market share. So this is where we can see solid growth. That's one thing. second etching system the DRAM is growing rapidly so DRAM's capacitor etch we have very strong position for capacitor etch of DRAM for interconnect etching of interconnect as I said in my presentation for five years, the 500 billion yen that's what I said, but now we can getting closer to 1 trillion yen within 5 years so the sales is expected to almost doubled so etching business is expected to grow rapidly or drastically in CY2027 and onward so mass production process of record POR there is opportunity to further expand the share for the cryogenic etching, because we have already won the mass production POR, and the film deposition having very high gap fill performance. This is rather advanced, so it's not right now, but we have a very good progress in evaluation of the gap fill. So Cota Developer, Etching System, Advanced Packaging, as well as 3DI, Dabonda, Dabonda. So these areas are expected to grow rapidly. For Prover, a huge number of inquiries are now coming to our company. So when you compare our entire sales, the portion of Prover sales is limited, but prover business do have the very high potential for growth. So now the old directions, you are having very good expectation. So focusing on the leading edge, we are working very hard. So drivers, as I said in my presentation, AI server. So we are working in every direction so that we can promote growth in every direction of our business. or every aspect of our business. Thank you very much, Mr. Nakamura, for your question. Next question is from Yoshioka-san from Nomura Securities. This is Yoshioka from Nomura Securities. I have a question regarding profitability enhancement. On page 15, you showed us earlier, there are five initiatives shown here. So pricing optimization, you already gave us some comments. So once again, there are five initiatives for each one of those five. I would like you to give us the timeline to see the effects and the magnitude of effects you can expect from each initiative. I want to get quantitative answer as much as possible. how much impact you can expect so timeline and magnitude of positive impacts, could you share that with us please so the number one so next generation system with high added value so that's our vision so company filled with dreams and vitality that contribute to technology innovation in semiconductors that's our vision in principle So we are investing area where the continuous technology innovation market growth is expected. In that sense, in every generation, new technology is necessary in a two-year or three-year cycle. we are going to upgrade the system or offer the new model so that we can contribute to the enhancement of yield in customers' fab or to uptime ratio and enhancement at customers' fab. eCompass covers enhancement of environmental performance. That's also part of our innovation. So number one and number two, all together, every year we try to deliver solutions to help customers to enhance their productivity. So we have multiple equipment or we have a broad portfolio. We do have technology both for scaling and advanced packaging. So we get the several hundred billion yens of orders for new equipment. So we are providing solutions for our customers' burning challenges. And we also think about macroeconomy to optimize pricing, not only price increase, but we try to optimize our pricing. So our customers' challenge, as I said earlier, is productivity enhancement. That is the area of customer challenge. In that sense, it's enhancement and maintenance time reduction. And when maintenance takes time, so we need to reduce maintenance frequency by reducing defect or reducing particles. And by using AI, like Ipsida, we try to contribute to customer and we provide value to the customer and we also improve our profitability. and the higher-efficient start-up of equipment, we deliver 4,000 to 6,000 units per year. So start-up period from the delivery to the customer acceptance, that period will lead time. If we can reduce start-up time by half, then we can improve our employees' work-life balance drastically, and also we can improve safety and also we can reduce accommodation expenses as well. With continued creation of strong next-generation products and incorporate the methods to reduce startup time by half, then we can improve entire efficiency. So every time we release a new model, we want to implement those activities. I talked a little bit in details, but this is how I try to answer to your question. Thank you very much. In principle, the pricing should be the primary factor, short time. Yes, in short term, yes, pricing is important, but we cannot continue doing optimization. But when it looks just like a short time period, pricing is important. But continuously, we are working on number one, two, three, and four. We want to work on those four items for a long time on a continual basis. Yoshioka-san, thank you very much for your question. Two more questions. Next question is Yamamoto-san from Mizuho Securities. I am Yamamoto from Mizuho Securities. I have a question regarding share. Every year, Kawai-san talks about WFE market, and you try to outperform WFE market. So when you try to see the results, over the past five years, your share has been declining. Even if you can see some increase in share next year, your market share declines over the past five years. I wonder why your share has been declining. The yen depreciation could be one factor, but from the user's viewpoint, even under the yen depreciation, your share didn't increase so much. maybe in the future things might be different so what will be different what makes you different so what makes Tokyo Electron share higher in the future could you give us some comment please so primary factor is of course the exchange rate is rather so back in 2020 one dollar was 150 yen when we set up the mid-term management plan back in 2022 last year 146 yen and this year 163 yen so the exchange rate is a very influential at the same time inflation is another factor and we must promote pricing optimization furthermore that's one thing in principle there are some other things the US-China trade controls, export controls, especially edge system. Chinese players want to purchase the American-made equipment ahead of other companies' products. That has some impact on our performance. And customers, for which our share is rather high, and when that sort of customer reduced investment plan or reduced investment, I think those three factors were the reason why our share is not so high and we are now aware of the issue. So that's the reason why we try to promote those five initiatives under the new management team to enhance our profitability. By doing that, I think our share will be improving. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Yamamoto-san, thank you very much for your question. The last question is from Nakanomio-san from Jefferies, Japan. I am Nakanomio. Can you hear me? Yes. I'm sorry. Thank you very much for giving some time. I have one question for the 36.8 percent is the gross profit margin in the first quarter so that is higher than your guidance 46.8 yes 46.8 percent so what is the reason for that and the first half in maybe second quarter should be 45%. So once again, I would like to get some clarification from your side. Thank you very much. So first quarter, so let us pull in from the second quarter because of strong needs from the customer, the profit margin as a result is rather high but as for second quarter, we do receive strong inquiries so we had the high expectation but as I said earlier because of product mix or fixed cost there are some increasing trend of the fixed cost so that's the reason why we set this gross profit margin for second quarter Mr. Nakonomio thank you very much for your question we do receive some more questions in text as well but this is time for us to close our financial announcement We will follow up the questions we couldn't answer today on our website in a few days. Lastly, we'd like to continuously improve our IR activities based on your precious feedback, so we would appreciate your kind cooperation in filling out questionnaire before you exit the WebEx. Thank you very much for taking time to join us in this conference despite your busy schedule. Thank you very much.