Tower sees soft Q1, then growth

LONDON – Tower Semiconductor Ltd., the specialty foundry that trades as TowerJazz, is forecasting a sharp drop in revenue in the first quarter of 2013 as it phases it out supply contracts with Micron Technology Inc. at a Japanese wafer fab and brings up replacement customers.

The company revealed the soft forecast at it announced it had made a net loss in 4Q12 of $23.4 million on revenue of $147.6 million. The revenue was down sequentially from $154.6 million in the prior quarter. This 4Q12 performance compares to the net loss of $16.7 million the company made on revenue of $174.6 million in 4Q11.

Tower (Migdal Haemek, Israel) acquired a wafer fab in Nishiwaki, Japan, from Micron Technology Inc. (Boise, Idaho) during 2012 and expects a significant dip in overall revenue in 1Q13 as Micron overhang orders decline and as other customer orders ramp up.

"Our recent introduction of an advanced SOI switch platform opens a new market for us and has already realized over 25 customer tape-outs. In 2012, we had over 450 full mask set tape outs and left the year with more than 400 new design wins. These numbers are at record levels and a strong indicator of customer traction and continued growth," said Russell Ellwanger, CEO of Tower, in a statement.

Tower is forecasting revenues in the range of $110 million to $120 million in the first quarter of 2013.

For the 2012 full year Tower made a net loss of $70.3 million on revenue of $638.8 million, compared wit a net loss of $18.5 million on revenues of $611.0 million in 2011.


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