ANSAN, South Korea--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Seoul Semiconductor Co., Ltd. (KOSDAQ 046890) (“Seoul”), a leading global innovator of LED products and technology, announced consolidated first-quarter revenues of 282 billion Korean won (KRW). Revenues fell 0.4% compared to same period last year but falls within the range of company’s guided KRW 280 billion ~ KRW 300 billion. Peers in the LED industry on average is expected to report more than double digit fall in revenues and profits.
The company reported KRW 17.0 billion of operating profit, recording 0.8% decline year-on-year from last year’s KRW 17.2 billion. The modest decline of profits comes from company’s lower utilization of 60% compared to 74% same period last year due to relocation of equipment among factories to further improve product mix and increase cost competitiveness in the long term. When the equipment is stabilized and as high seasonality starts in the second half especially fuelled by robust revenues from fast growing automotive lighting and display related products, the company expects 2019 annual revenues and profits to exceed prior annual record sales and profits.
Seoul provided sales guidance of KRW 280 to 300 billion for the upcoming second-quarter.
The company is expected to introduce many new products this year. In the second quarter, new improved UV LED products will start replacing lower priced mercury lamps. UV LEDs can be widely adopted for disinfection systems and healthy lightings with no mercury. In addition to these offerings, new VCSEL products are also scheduled to be launched in the second half of this year.
“Seoul has plans to apply new technologies in the mobile segment this year. These efforts together with the new Vietnam plant contributing to higher utilization once fully set up, will help deliver superior revenue and profit growth once again exceeding prior annual sales and profits,” said Sam Ryu, executive vice president of IT sales at Seoul.
About Seoul Semiconductor
Seoul Semiconductor develops and commercializes LEDs for automotive, general illumination, specialty lighting, and backlighting markets. As the second-largest LED manufacturer globally excluding the captive market, Seoul holds more than 14,000 patents, offers a wide range of technologies, and mass produces innovative LED products such as SunLike – delivering the world’s best light quality in a next-generation LED enabling human-centric lighting optimized for circadian rhythms; WICOP – a simpler structured package-free LED which provides market leading color uniformity and cost savings at the fixture level, providing high lumen density and design flexibility; NanoDriver Series – the world’s smallest 24W DC LED drivers; Acrich, the world’s first high-voltage AC-driven LED technology developed in 2005, including all AC LED-related technologies from chip to module and circuit fabrication, and nPola, a new LED product based on GaN-substrate technology that achieves more than ten times the output of conventional LEDs. For more information, please visit www.seoulsemicon.com/en.
