Aehr Test Systems Reports 89% Revenue Growth Year over Year

FREMONT, Calif., Oct. 06, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Aehr Test Systems (NASDAQ: AEHR), a worldwide provider of semiconductor take a look at and reliability qualification gear, in the present day introduced monetary outcomes for its first quarter of fiscal 2023 ended August 31, 2022.

Fiscal First Quarter Financial Results:

• Net gross sales had been $10.7 million, up 89% from $5.6 million within the first quarter of fiscal 2022.
• GAAP web revenue was $589,000, or $0.02 per diluted share, in comparison with GAAP web revenue of $696,000, or $0.03 per diluted share, within the first quarter of fiscal 2022, which incorporates the affect of forgiveness of $1.7 million in loans from the Paycheck Protection Program (“PPP”).
• Non-GAAP web revenue was $1.3 million, or $0.05 per diluted share, which excludes the affect of stock-based compensation, in comparison with a non-GAAP web lack of $414,000, or $0.02 per diluted share, within the first quarter of fiscal 2022, which excludes the affect of stock-based compensation and forgiveness of the PPP mortgage.
• Bookings had been $19.1 million for the quarter ended August 31, 2022.
• Backlog as of August 31, 2022 was $19.5 million.
• Total money and money equivalents as of August 31, 2022 had been $36.1 million, up from $6.5 million on the finish of the primary quarter of fiscal 2022.

An clarification of using non-GAAP monetary measures and a reconciliation of Aehr’s non-GAAP monetary measures to essentially the most instantly comparable GAAP monetary measures may be discovered within the accompanying tables.

Gayn Erickson, President and CEO of Aehr Test Systems, commented:

“We are off to a good start this year, finishing the first quarter with revenue and net income ahead of consensus estimates, and with strong bookings of $19.1 million.

“We are currently engaged or in discussions with almost all the existing and future silicon carbide suppliers regarding our unique, low cost, multi-wafer level test and burn-in solution that provides test electronics and device contactor technology that enables contact to 100% of devices on a single wafer. This allows our customers to burn-in every device at a lower cost than they could in any other form due to our ability to contact thousands of devices on a single wafer and test 18 wafers in a single system at one time with our FOX-XP^TM multi-wafer test and burn-in system and proprietary FOX full wafer contact WaferPaks^TM. The major silicon carbide companies expect that most electric vehicle traction inverters will move to multi-chip modules, and they have told us that they must move to wafer-level stress and burn-in to remove the inherent failures before they put these devices into multi-die modules to meet their cost, yield, and reliability goals of these modules. Aehr’s technology provides a total turnkey single vendor solution to meet these customers’ critical test and stress requirements.

“Our lead customer for silicon carbide wafer level burn-in continues to ramp up use of our FOX-XP multi-wafer test and burn-in systems and WaferPaks, placing another significant order with us during this quarter. Similar to past orders, they purchased the systems without the necessary WaferPak full wafer contactors and as such, we expect significant orders from them for WaferPaks to match these systems. This need for additional capacity is being driven by increased demand for silicon carbide semiconductors for electric vehicles. This customer recently announced that they expect their growth rate to accelerate faster than previously forecasted, and they continue to forecast orders for a significant number of FOX systems and WaferPak Contactors over the next several years.

“Our previously announced benchmarks and evaluations with two additional major silicon carbide semiconductor suppliers continued to move forward with great progress during the quarter. Following the end of the quarter, we announced an initial purchase order from one of these suppliers for our FOX-NP multi-wafer test and burn-in system, multiple WaferPak Contactors, and a FOX WaferPak Aligner to be used for qualification of our wafer level burn-in solution for silicon carbide devices for electric vehicles and other markets. This new customer is one of the world’s largest suppliers of silicon carbide devices serving several significant markets including the electric vehicle industry. We have already shipped the system to them, and we believe we will achieve their specific performance and functionality evaluation criteria on their test floor during the next three to six months as well as expect that they will be purchasing our FOX-XP production systems for shipment before the end of this fiscal year ending May 31, 2023. The benchmark with the other potential customer has also progressed significantly since last quarter’s conference call. We completed a significant milestone with a large number of wafers being tested, and we believe that we will successfully complete their correlation over the next few months, allowing them to also move forward with our FOX solution. We expect both of these major silicon carbide suppliers to implement our FOX platform solution into their volume manufacturing production flow as they look to capitalize on the fast-growing demand for silicon carbide devices in electric vehicles.

“We see demand building for wafer level burn-in of silicon carbide devices and specifically for traction inverters and onboard and offboard chargers for electric vehicles. During the last few months, multiple additional silicon carbide suppliers have asked us to provide technical feasibility, quotations, and schedules for production test and burn-in of their wafers. While some of these companies want to do on-wafer validation of our solutions before they place orders for systems from us, others are planning to move directly to purchasing our FOX systems and WaferPaks to accelerate their time to market. The silicon carbide market for electric vehicles and its supporting infrastructure requirements are growing at a tremendous rate, with Canaccord Genuity estimating that wafer capacity will increase from 125,000 6-inch wafers in 2021 to over four million 6-inch equivalent wafers in 2030 to meet the electric vehicle market alone.

“In addition to our progress with silicon carbide applications, we are seeing an increase in our wafer level burn-in business for silicon photonics devices used in data communications. We shipped multiple FOX-NP systems this quarter to support the characterization and product qualification of new photonics-based devices. We have also received multiple orders for upgrades to existing systems that enable a higher number of devices and higher power per wafer, as well as for new designs for WaferPaks that we expect will first be ordered for engineering and new product introduction, and then turn to volume production with higher quantity orders. 
                
“We are very encouraged by the continued positive momentum and expanding growth opportunities we are seeing with current and prospective customers and are reiterating our previously announced guidance for revenue this fiscal year as we expect revenue to grow over the next three quarters. We believe that we will receive production orders from several silicon carbide customers beyond our lead customer and begin shipping systems to meet their production capacity by the end of our current fiscal year that ends May 31, 2023. Beyond our engagements with some of the top major automotive suppliers, we are also seeing high levels of interest and discussion with other silicon carbide prospects across the spectrum of industrial, solar, wind, and charging infrastructure markets that is expanding our potential customer base and giving us increased confidence about our growth prospects for fiscal 2024 and beyond.”

Fiscal 2023 Financial Guidance:

For the fiscal yr ending May 31, 2023, Aehr is reiterating its beforehand supplied steering for complete income to be no less than $60 million to $70 million, with robust revenue margins just like final fiscal yr. Aehr additionally continues to count on bookings to develop quicker than revenues in fiscal 2023 because the ramp in demand for silicon carbide in electrical automobiles will increase exponentially all through the last decade. 

Management Conference Call and Webcast

Aehr Test Systems will host a convention name and webcast in the present day at 5:00 p.m. Eastern (2:00 p.m. PT) to debate its first quarter fiscal 2023 working outcomes. To entry the reside name, dial +1 877-270-2148 (US and Canada) or +1 412-902-6510 (International) and ask to hitch the Aehr Test Systems earnings name. In addition, a reside and archived webcast of the convention name shall be accessible over the Internet at www.aehr.com within the Investor Relations part and may be accessed by clicking right here. A replay of the convention name can even be accessible through phone starting roughly two hours after conclusion of the decision and can stay accessible for one week. To entry the decision replay, dial +1 877-344-7529 (US and Canada) or +1 412-317-0088 (International) and enter replay passcode 8724719.

About Aehr Test Systems

Headquartered in Fremont, California, Aehr Test Systems is a worldwide supplier of take a look at techniques for burning-in semiconductor units in wafer stage, singulated die, and package deal half type, and has put in over 2,500 techniques worldwide. Increased high quality and reliability wants of the Automotive and Mobility built-in circuit markets are driving extra take a look at necessities, incremental capability wants, and new alternatives for Aehr Test merchandise in package deal, wafer stage, and singulated die/module stage take a look at. Aehr Test has developed and launched a number of modern merchandise, together with the ABTS^TM and FOX-P^TM households of take a look at and burn-in techniques and FOX WaferPak^TM Aligner, FOX WaferPak Contactor, FOX DiePak^® Carrier and FOX DiePak Loader. The ABTS system is utilized in manufacturing and qualification testing of packaged components for each decrease energy and better energy logic units in addition to all widespread kinds of reminiscence units. The FOX-XP and FOX-NP techniques are full wafer contact and singulated die/module take a look at and burn-in techniques used for burn-in and practical take a look at of advanced units, akin to modern silicon carbide-based energy semiconductors, recollections, digital sign processors, microprocessors, microcontrollers, systems-on-a-chip, and built-in optical units. The FOX-CP system is a brand new low-cost single-wafer compact take a look at and reliability verification answer for logic, reminiscence and photonic units and the most recent addition to the FOX-P product household. The WaferPak Contactor accommodates a novel full wafer probe card able to testing wafers as much as 300mm that permits IC producers to carry out take a look at and burn-in of full wafers on Aehr Test FOX techniques. The DiePak Carrier is a reusable, momentary package deal that permits IC producers to carry out cost-effective ultimate take a look at and burn-in of each naked die and modules. For extra info, please go to Aehr Test Systems’ web site at www.aehr.com.

Safe Harbor Statement

This press launch accommodates sure forward-looking statements inside the that means of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933 and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934. Forward-looking statements usually relate to future occasions or Aehr’s future monetary or working efficiency. In some instances, you may determine forward-looking statements as a result of they comprise phrases akin to “may,” “will,” “should,” “expects,” “plans,” “anticipates,” “going to,” “may,” “intends,” “goal,” “tasks,” “contemplates,” “believes,” “estimates,” “predicts,” “potential,” “sees,” or “proceed,” or the negative of these words or other similar terms or expressions that concern Aehr’s expectations, strategy, priorities, plans, or intentions. Forward-looking statements in this press release include, but are not limited to, Aehr’s ability to generate bookings and revenue increases in the future, including the second quarter of fiscal 2023; future requirements and orders of Aehr’s new and existing customers; bookings forecasted for proprietary WaferPak^TM and DiePak consumables across multiple market segments; the temporary nature of customer pushouts; shipping timelines for products and follow-on capacity orders; the growth of Aehr’s systems and consumables, including as a percentage of total sales; financial guidance for fiscal 2023, including related to revenue and profitability, and expectations regarding fiscal 2023; Aehr’s ability to expand its number of customers using its FOX-P^TM solutions; the ability to secure potential customer engagements; expectations related to long-term demand for Aehr’s productions and the attractiveness of key markets; the belief that Aehr will be stronger after the current worldwide COVID-19 pandemic, including expectations related to greater production, more customers, more applications, and higher value products. The forward-looking statements contained in this press release are also subject to other risks and uncertainties, including those more fully described in Aehr’s recent 10-K, 10-Q and other reports filed from time to time with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Aehr disclaims any obligation to update information contained in any forward-looking statement to reflect events or circumstances occurring after the date of this press release.

– Financial Tables to Follow –

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