Seoul Semiconductor Reports Second Quarter Operating Profit Up 70% on Year
August 13, 2021
Seoul Semiconductor Co., Ltd. (“Seoul”), announced KRW 336.8 billion of consolidated revenues and KRW 23.4 billion of operating profit (6.9% margin) for the second quarter, each growing by 25.6% and 70.3% year on year. Net profit for the first half reached KRW 43.9 billion, already exceeding 2020 full year net profit of 29.0 billion, which implies higher dividend income opportunities for investors towards year-end. Second quarter revenue of KRW 336.8 billion is the record high quarterly revenue.
Double digit growth continued across all divisions including Display, General Lighting and Automotive, while the Automotive division led the growth by doubling its revenue year on year. “We started quarter against concerns regarding semiconductor shortage within the car industry manufacturing value chain. However, we managed to overcome headwinds thanks to structural growth from WICOP, our patented LED chip technology with a robust structure. WICOP is now applied to more than 102 car models globally this year as our automotive division entered secular growth stage,” said an officer of Seoul.
WICOP is designed to be a compact form factor suitable for slim and thin lenses as it does not require wire bonding or packaging. Also, thanks to its long product lifetime and high efficiency of heat conductivity, WICOP is actively applied to TV backlighting LEDs. WICOP chips are applied to about 20% of all global TVs.
Seoul expects its revenue for the third quarter to be between KRW 340 billion and KRW 360 billion growing 3% to 9% year on year, suggesting another quarter of all-time high revenue. “In the second half, mass production for the mini LED, one of the next generation display technologies is expected to begin. On top of that, we already raised our capital expenditures in the first half to cope with an upbeat demand forecast for general lighting and automotive LED,” said the officer of Seoul.