WESTWOOD, Mass. -- Has the automatic test equipment (ATE) business finally hit the bottom amid the current and sharp downturn in the IC industry?
At least one ATE vendor--LTX Corp.--here announced that its business has hit the bottom and claimed its order rates are picking up in its current second fiscal quarter. The quarter ends Jan. 31.
Business in general is looking up for LTX, declared Roger Blethen, president and CEO of the Westwood-based company. "During the first quarter, we saw signs that our industry has hit the bottom," Blethen said. "We also see significant increases in orders for the quarter that ends in January of 2002," he said during a conference call with analysts on Monday.
But analysts wonder if LTX is still hunting for the bottom, given the company's wide ranging outlook in the second period. The Westwood-based ATE supplier projects that its sales will sequentially decline anywhere from 6-30% in the second quarter, as compared to the first period, ended Oct. 31.
On Tuesday, LTX reported a net loss of $9.4 million, or minus $0.19 a share, on sharply lower sales of $33.0 million in the company's fiscal first quarter. LTX's revenues were 66% lower than $98 million in the fiscal quarter last year due to the severe downturn in semiconductor test markets (see Nov. 13 story ).
The results represent a 30.2% sequential sales drop from its fourth fiscal quarter. It reported a loss of $2.1 million, or minus $0.04 a share, on sales of $47.3 million in that period.
Going forward, the company expects to report sales of $27 million--plus or minus $4 million--in the second quarter of this year--or a 6-30% drop from the previous period. It also projects to report a loss of $0.27, plus or minus $0.02, in this period.
"The outlook is improved for LTX," Blethen insisted during the conference call. "We see a decline in revenues, but our orders are increasing."
During the last quarter, the LTX CEO said the company garnered two new customers for its bread-and-butter Fusion line of ATE systems. In total, LTX has 34 customers for the Fusion line, since it was introduced a little over two years ago. It also claims to have an installed base of 200 systems in the field.
However, the company's bookings were "weaker-than-expected" in the first fiscal quarter, according to a report from Morgan Stanley & Co. Inc. in San Francisco. "Q1 bookings were approximately $18 million, down 30% sequentially and in line with our forecast," the report said. "The gross book-to bill ratio was 0.55," the report said.
Moving forward, LTX's business is improving--at least on the bookings front. "F2Q02 bookings will likely increase greater than 75% sequentially to $27-$30 million from F1Q," the report said. "We admit the sequential growth is off of a low base, but nonetheless is very encouraging," it added.
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