Seoul Semiconductor Achieves Continuous Revenue Growth Despite of Elevating Competition with the Chinese LED Manufacturers
SEOUL, South Korea–(BUSINESS WIRE)– Seoul Semiconductor Co., Ltd. (KOSDAQ 046890), a market leader in LED (light emitting diode) design and manufacturing, today announced consolidated second-quarter revenues of KRW 267 billion. The rise in consolidated revenue came from strong sales in general lighting and strengths across all divisions within the company. The year over year rise in automotive lighting sales proved highly profitable for the company.
For the lighting division, while the differentiated product such as Wicop and Acrich increased in great proportion, automotive exterior lamps, e.g. daytime running lights and headlights continued their fast-paced growth. Automotive lighting is an area of high entry barriers due to high technology requirements and intellectual properties. Seoul expects to gain further market share with its differentiated Wicop technology. For the IT division, current customers expanding their product line-ups and new customer acquisitions were the main drivers for the rising sales figures.
To improve share price stability and increase shareholder value, Seoul announced plans to almost double its future dividends, based on the fact that its current level of pay-out is half the industry average and an increase up to the industry average is necessary. In addition, the company has sufficient cash generation capabilities since it has booked above 20% gains in EBITDA, leaving sufficient funds available for future investments. This was part of Seoul’s last quarter’s announcement to execute a KRW 10 billion share buyback program.
Company outlook
The company has provided revenue guidance of KRW 260 to 280 billion for the third quarter. The company plans to further strengthen its sales and marketing activities for its unique technologies including Acrich and Wicop and focus on acquiring more customers to reach new heights with respect to earnings.
The company’s Chief Financial Officer Sangbum Lee stated that SunLike, a new LED technology that produces light closely matching the spectrum of natural sunlight, unveiled at a press conference in Frankfurt, Germany in June, had been very well received with great interest from global customers. The company plans to launch additional new products during the remainder of the year and focus on protecting intellectual properties owned by the company.
About Seoul Semiconductor:
Seoul Semiconductor develops and commercializes light emitting diodes (LEDs) for automotive, general illumination, specialty lighting, and backlighting markets. As the fourth-largest LED manufacturer globally, Seoul Semiconductor holds more than 12,000 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, cost savings at the fixture level with high lumen density and allows design flexibility; NanoDriver Series –World’s Smallest 24W DC LED Drivers; Acrich, the world’s first high-voltage AC-driven LED technology developed in 2005, includes all AC LED-related technologies from chip to module and circuit fabrication, as well as multi-junction technology (MJT); and nPola, a new LED product based on GaN-substrate technology that achieves over ten times the output of conventional LEDs. For more information about Seoul Semiconductor, please visit http://www.seoulsemicon.com
# Trademarks
Wicop and Acrich are trademarks of Seoul Semiconductor Co., Ltd.
Investor information and additional product details are available on the company website http://www.seoulsemicon.com/en/ir and www.seoulsemiconductor.com.
Forward Looking Statements:
This press release material contains forward-looking statements which reflect Seoul Semiconductor’s current views with respect to future events and financial performance, and are subject to certain risks and uncertainties, which could cause actual results to differ materially from those anticipated. Although Seoul Semiconductor believes the expectations reflected in such forward-looking statements are to be based upon reasonable assumptions, it can give no assurance that its expectations will be attained. Seoul Semiconductor undertakes no obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events, or otherwise. All financial figures are consolidated figures unless stated otherwise.
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Contacts
Seoul Semiconductor Europe GmbH
Ariane Heim
Tel: +49 (0)89 450 3690-0
Email: press.eu@seoulsemicon.com