Alchip Technologies, Limited (3661) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary
March 6, 2020
Earnings Call Speaker Segments
Daniel Wang
executiveOkay. Hello, everyone. Welcome to Alchip Technologies 2019 digital investor meeting. This meeting, we -- will be in English. So if you need the Mandarin version, the Chinese version of slides, please go through the MOPS on [Foreign Language] to download the presentation material. [Operator Instructions] And the video and the audio content of this meeting will upload to MOPS. [Foreign Language] Right after this meeting, when we finish the recording of the video. So because of the coronavirus we are so sorry for use this [indiscernible] institutional investor [indiscernible]. So I think in the first session, I will hand it to our CEO, Johnny Shen to do a brief opening for our company and some 2019 results report. Thank you for participating in this meeting. Okay. Johnny, please.
Johnny Shen
executiveOkay. Ladies and gentlemen, thanks for coming to the Investor conference meeting. My name is Johnny Shen, CEO and Cofounder of Alchip Technologies. It's a very first time for us to host the conference meeting online. And also due to the foreign investment percentage increase that we decide to use English to run this meeting. And honestly, companies still prefer to have a face-to-face meeting instead of online. But during this special virus situation, please bear with us, and thanks for your understanding. Quick go through our company current status. I believe most of people already familiar with the Alchip. The company is founded in 2003. We went public in 2014. Currently, we have 450 people and company is still growing. By the end of this year, we are shooting for 500 or plus. 75% of our employee are engineers. So we are purely engineer-oriented company. Since we found this company in 2003, we've been successfully taped out more than 420 designs. Last year's number, we have achieved 140 million. Yes, we also have more than $22 million our R&D investment. And we are the -- one of the TSMC agent, we call Value Chain Aggregator. Next slide, please. I believe most of people should understand the ASIC market now. ASIC market is very big and unique. Unlike a standard product company, one chip need to serve multiple customers, by definition, ASIC -- one ASIC chip only serve one product. Outstanding product company need to make their own chip. In order to improve the product efficiency and also differentiate to their competitors. Alchip is doing the ASIC business since we found the company. We focus on HPC and AI area. HPC and AI always require the most [indiscernible] technology currently using 16-nanometer or 7-nanometer, eventually we'll use 5-nanometer or below. The chip itself is a very big and complicated. The entry barrier for our competitor will be getting higher and higher. We truly believe the big data accumulation through fast -- and also the Internet bandwidth improve. Industry always need more powerful and envision ship in order to analyze the data. Therefore, this application will continually grow and sustain. We also expect profit margin will be reasonable since most of our HPC and AI company are highly profitable. I believe this application will continuously bring reasonable profit to the company. Next slide, please. Let me recap the achievement for the last year. Yes, basically, we have a conference meeting every quarter. And also smaller group of meeting, hosted by Daniel, sometimes weekly, sometimes biweekly. At the end, we meet our revenue target. The revenue number is $140 million, we're up 22% year-over-year. Net income, $14 million, EPS [ $72 million ] both of them are record high for the company, a historical high for the company. The capital market performance, we are also doing a very good job. Share price appreciate more than 3x also with very high liquidity. And our investors wait for the foreign investment getting higher and higher and also institutional investors keep increasing. Company achieved all quarter even monthly profitable. We also have -- last year, as you remember, we start to penetrate U.S. region. Yes, we also have a very good progress on U.S. We've been successfully penetrate our target AI users. Right now, we can proudly to say, every single -- every major AI user, they all know about Alchip. For sure, we will be one of their solution, one of their choices if they want to do, like, the AI chip. We gradually diversify the dependency of the China region. In fact, we already won few key accounts even with the 5-nanometer opportunities. We have a great position in HPC and AI field. Right now, majority of our revenue, so-called more than 70% are contributed by the HPC and AI. We have a 6 design in high-volume production right now, multiple 7 design -- 7-nanometer design ongoing, that will gradually tape-out from this year. Yes, in fact, other than the 7 -- other than those ongoing design, we have many design in the pipeline for 7-nanometer. In additional to 7-nanometer design, we also have a -- many 22, 16 and 12-nanometer design [ win ], and some of them are on the bidding. Yes, last recap and also the highlight for the company is, our crisis management and control. Yes, we have a limited impact, but huge benefit from the trade war. China government, I mean, China government and [ city ] continuously inject a lot of funding on the CPU and HPC. Most of our customers are beneficial of the China investment, and we see more and more order from them. Great reaction during the coronavirus situation. Government just announced additional 2 to 3 weeks holiday, but our engineer, 90% of our engineers could work from home efficiently. Yes, as you know, we have -- our database is all sitting on the cloud. So it makes no difference for our engineer working from office or from home. Since all the database are sitting on one place. So at the end, all projects are securely well with no delay. So that's a quick recap and also review for the 2019. Right now, I will pass the detailed numbers discrimination to our CFO and speaker. Daniel, please.
Daniel Wang
executiveOkay. Welcome, everyone. For the financial session, I will state our last year performance. So for the numbers, I believe you -- since we already announced every month top and bottom line. I think the revenue and the net income should be well-known by the market, I still brief a little bit. For the fourth quarter last year, the total revenue is $47 million, which is 61% quarter-on-quarter and 83% year-on-year growth. And for the operating income it's $4.6 million for the [ fourth ] quarter and that is 35% total for the growth. And for the net income, since we have done government subsidy campaign in last 4 quarters, so the net income is $4.6 million, up 24% quarter-on-quarter. Translating into EPS of $2.34. The year 2018 is a good year for us. The total revenue is $140.1 million, up 22% year-on-year. And the net income was $14 million, up 64% year-on-year, translating into EPS of $7.2. And then the following is the breakdown for the application and technology node and the original breakdown for Alchip last year. For the quarterly breakdown, you can see on the left-hand side. This time, we separate the HPC from other applications. It's a new category for our application breakdown since we didn't review the previous conference meeting. Everyone can see that the HPC revenue accounts for a majority of our total revenue each quarter last year, especially for the third quarter and the fourth quarter. For the whole year, the HPC -- the revenue come from HPC accounts for 59% of our total revenue, followed by the networking 14% percent and the niche market, 18%. And the consumer, now it only accounts for 9% of total revenue in 2019. For the AI application, the AI application is within the HPC field. So the 59% include the AI and the CPU. For the process [indiscernible] breakdown. You can see the total breakdown, and it's very obvious that the 7-nanometer and the 16-nanometer have already become the majority of our revenue source. And for the advanced technology node, you can all see the 28-nanometer or even -- or more advanced technology now already accounts for 90% of our total revenue in 2019. And for the 16-nanometer -- for the 7-nanometer in 2019, it accounts for 27% of our total revenue. I believe such performance should be the leader within our industry. For the revenue breakdown by region, it's pretty straightforward. You can see that Korea -- now we don't have too many business from Korea. And obviously, because of China CPU and other projects, the China region has already become the #1 revenue contributor to Alchip. And for the others, you may see the others keeps on growing for the past 4 quarters and for the past 3 years. The reason behind is -- the U.S. market -- we have been very, I would say, successful in the U.S. market penetration. So I believe the U.S. market -- the revenue contribution of U.S. market will gradually surpass the contribution from Japan, maybe 1 or 2 years later. So the industry view, many investors focus on our China CPU business. And keeps on asking how the coronavirus will affect the shipment. So far, I would say, the customer's current forecast remain unchanged. Even though the coronavirus epidemic and [indiscernible] change between China and the U.S. For now, the focus is still very strong until the year-end. If we look into the quarterly pattern, the first quarter will be higher, and in the second quarter will be down a little bit. And the length in the third quarter, the China shipment will recover to above maybe 1 quarter level, and then the fourth quarter will still remain strong. And in addition to the current shipments of 2 to 3 chips to our China customers, the next generation projects are kicking in -- actually, we are already doing the design for 3 to 4, 7-nanometer projects for our China customers. So AI market demand, which is still strong, although for now, there is no significant production shipments currently. But the new design demand gets stronger and stronger for the North American market and for the Middle East, and for the China region. The shipment for AI chip, I believe, we are gradually kicking starting the, I would say, like the second -- early second quarter this year, since the shipment will -- the shipment to the North American customers, the shipment to the Middle East customers will begin in the second quarter this year. And as the other projects enter in the [ takeout ] phase, we will see an uptake for the AI shipments this year. And we have key accounts even with the 5-nanometer opportunity for design. For the business outlook, I think China CPU -- I think everybody already acknowledged that the China CPU shipment is still a major revenue driver for this year's revenue growth. First of all, we -- the shipment will be a 4-year shipments. Last year, we shipped the China CPU in only the first quarter, which is kind of -- which was kind of sluggish and a very little amount for the second quarter last year. And small amount for the third quarter last year and pretty good amount for the fourth quarter last year. For this year, every quarter will be good for the China CPU shipment. And of course, the order size is expending. So we expect the China CPU shipment to drive this year's revenue growth. And for this year, the shipment for the 7-nanometer CPU chip could be the critical factor to the second-half revenue growth. Based on our schedule, we will start to ship out the 7-nanometer CPU type chips to our customers starting in the third quarter this year. But since the 7-nanometer quota -- the 7-nanometer capacity of TSMCs very tight right now. We cannot make sure so far for the capacity support from TSMC. But the things is getting better and better, we are currently optimistic towards the support of TSMC since the overall consumer market demanded for 7-nanometer capacity is weakened. So honestly, at current stage, we are becoming more optimistic. Well, the 7-nanometer project will become -- this year, the 7-nanometer project will become our mainstream technology node. Actually, this kind of breakdown already begin starting from the third quarter last year. You can check it from the process-node breakdown in previous slide. And there are multiple 7-nanometers markets from China, we are either already taped out or we are all in the design phase. And we have multiple 7-nanometer projects from Middle East customers, all of them are AI-type customers. And we also have multiple 7-nanometer projects for North American customers. And for the tape-outs, the 7-nanometer projects, we also, based on our schedule, we also believe there are multiple 7-nanometer projects, I would say, more than 3 to 4 will tape-out this year. So according to the information, we are currently very optimistic towards our revenue growth this year. And then I think our CEO can do some outlook closing statements from now. Johnny?
Johnny Shen
executiveOkay. Yes. Yes, just a quick recap. We reserve more time for the question. So basically, 2019 is a -- was a great year for the company. In fact, it was the best year so far. Based on our current outlook, if we count out all the uncertainty, for example, the TSMC capacity issue or any unavoidable disaster, yes, we have a confidence that 2020 is going to be another record-breaking year for both top line and bottom line for both production and service. Right now, just like Daniel say, a 7-nanometer become mainstream of our product line, yes, we have a lot of current projects. The current project will ensure our revenue growing for this year. The strong pipeline and project will keep the momentum last all the way to next year. So overall, I think 2020, again, is going to be another wonderful year for the company.
Daniel Wang
executiveOkay. Now with the Q&A session. I haven't seen the questions from -- the read-in questions. I only see the hand raising. So let's start from the purple one. Okay. Charlie, you are unmuted, please.
Charlie Chan
analystOkay. Can you hear me okay?
Daniel Wang
executiveSure, sure.
Charlie Chan
analystOkay. And congratulations for your good results and execution. So first of all, can you give us some more quantified revenue and margin guidance for first quarter and the full year? And also, I'm also very curious about user feedback for your -- those local PC CPU system? And do you think there -- that demand is sustainable? Can we start from here?
Daniel Wang
executiveOkay. For the revenue and the target, the margin guidance, I would say, okay. I think many people already heard from the meeting in our company that we -- our goal for this year, the revenue target we are targeting $200 million revenue growth -- the $200 million revenue -- for the revenue for the top line front. For the gross margin, it's hard to tell right now because the percentage of NRE has showed great interest to our gross margin. But so far, based on our estimation, we think the margin will not be as high as to the level of last year because last year, our NRE percentage is almost like 60%, close to 60%. But for this year, in the beginning, I would say, the breakdown for NRE and production. The line will be like 40-something NRE -- 40%-something for NRE and the 50%-something for mass-production. The gross -- the blended gross margin will be lower to last year's level. But for now, since the current-production margins looks a little bit better than we previously think. So I think our gross margin level will be around middle-30s. And for the user experience, honestly, I didn't use the PC that embedded with our customers, CPU. So I will hand this question over to Johnny to see if Johnny any input. So Johnny. Please.
Johnny Shen
executiveYes. I got it. Yes. Thanks, Charlie. Yes. Overall, I think yes. As you can see, our -- the revenue difference between Q4 and Q3. Q4, we have -- last year, Q4, we have a more significant growth, yes, I believe this momentum will last to Q1 as well. So I think the momentum will remain. So overall, just like Daniel said, we are shooting for more -- break $200 million for this year. And HPC and AI mass production will kick in. Like I mentioned before, the profit margin for these 2 fields, even the mass production profit margin for these 2 fields are much higher than the consumer. And also, we have more and more design, more and more design opportunity. Based on current estimation, just as like the Daniel say, 45%, 55% for the service in mass production, but we do see some momentum for the additional service revenue. Yes, that will happen later this year. Q1, I think -- I have a confidence, I think the Q1 is going to be a very good quarter.
Charlie Chan
analystOkay. Yes. So on that a local PC system actually besides the end user feedback performers. It would be very helpful if you can give us some color about the total addressable market in China? Or the end customers and potential volume this year and the next year? That will be very helpful.
Johnny Shen
executiveDaniel, would you want to take this.
Daniel Wang
executiveOkay. Charlie honestly, I don't have such kind of information for you because we don't know the user experience. But as I know, because [indiscernible] CPU is -- PC embedded with [indiscernible] CPU is built with the [indiscernible]. Currently [indiscernible] OS is the most friendly operating system for on-based PC or Notebook. So I guess, if we compare to the user experience between on-based or the Windows-based, I'll say, of course, the Windows-based will be better. But within ARM, I believe, the [indiscernible] CPU plus, [indiscernible] OS will be still not the leading user experience provided for the Arm-based notebook market. And for the addressable market, so far, we -- the answer is still the same that we think the scope now is to the SOE company. If every SOE or part of SOE, we don't know, but we believe the SOEs with critical information or related to the national security, for example, the financial sector and the telecom sector may be some of -- some sector with critical information, they will accelerate the adoption rate for China CPU inside the PC.
Charlie Chan
analystOkay, thanks.
Daniel Wang
executiveAnd Jeffrey, I will unmute you. Can you hear me? Jeffrey's [indiscernible]. Excuse me, Jeffrey. Can you hear me? Okay. No. Okay. Since there's no response. I will answer some questions from the written ones. Many people are still very interested in our revenue pattern. I would say -- for our quarterly revenue pattern. I will say for this year, unlike last year, we have a solid production revenue contribution throughout the whole year. So the revenue pattern will be the first quarter, I will still expect a flat or a little bit increased -- quarter-on-quarter increased for the first quarter. The revenue compared to the fourth quarter last year, I still believe there will be growth. And for the second quarter and third quarter is relatively flat. In general, we may see mild quarter-on-quarter growth for the first quarter, second quarter and the third quarter this year. And we expect a relatively significant jump for the revenue for the fourth quarter since the 7-nanometer production is scheduled to start shipment in late third quarter this year. And that's the question many people are asking about. And the second question is the operating expense plan for this year. For last year, our operating expense is about USD 37 million to USD 38 million. For this year, since we are -- keep on investing our R&D resource [indiscernible] [ engineering ] hiring and especially the machine. For the 7-nanometer, even a 5-nanometer projects, it consumes a lot of machine power. So because of that, I personally expect the operating expense for this year, will be ranging from like $44 million to $46 million, depends on the recruiting and the machine usage. Okay. That's the second question. And also, people are asking about 7-nanometer project profit margin. I think I will split into the NIE and the production. For the NRE, for the design i.e., the absolute amount of profit is the highest among all the process nodes. But for the gross margin, since for 7-nanometer the mask is expensive, the IP is also expensive. So for the gross margin, the 7-nanometer actually is lower than maybe the 6-nanometer or 20-nanometer for the gross margin rate in the percentage. But for our company, I guess many of you know already that we capitalize our mask and IP. So most of the time when NRE revenue kicks in, is almost like 90% to 100% gross margin. It depends on the milestone. And then the mask and IP will go to our fixed cost under amortization cost. So I believe these enters your questions very well. Okay. [indiscernible] is asking about the CapEx guidance in year 2020. Actually, if you look at our financial report that the majority, over 90% of our CapEx is the mask and IP. So as long as our business is doing well, and the CapEx will increase. It has a high -- it has a very high correlation with our NRE revenue. And [ Max ] is asking about the first quarter this year, the NRE and the mass-production breakdown. The revenue breakdown for the first quarter, I think, will be around 40-something for NRE and 50-something for MP but it really depends on the scheduling of our NRE milestone. Here, I would like to remind everyone that for the 7-nanometer project, a single milestone is easily like 2 million to 3 million. If less paper milestone is easily 8 million, 9 million. So if any of the milestone delay or pre, it will affect the revenue and especially the margin, a lot for the single quarter or for a single month. So yes, that's the -- our view to the first quarter. Okay. I guess Jeffrey is back. I will unmute Jeffrey. Okay. Jeffrey, can you hear me? You are ready to speak. Everybody can hear you, right now. Hello? Jeffrey from Macquarie. Jeff? Okay. Maybe there are some technical difficulty. So I will answer the question directly. Jeffrey is asking us to discuss more on the networking related business. Honestly, we are not put too much focus or attention to the networking right now since I know [indiscernible], the 5G is the hard topic for the market. But we don't think the 5G market is a super model for ASIC. I still believe the 5G market belongs to the ASSP product. And currently, we have do -- we have 2 projects related to 5G. One I can remember is the [indiscernible], it's like extension networking kind of chip for 5G network. But to us, this is not a big project. So it's -- so we don't expect significant or very quick work from this sector.
Johnny Shen
executiveYes. Let me add some comment on the 5G. Like Daniel mentioned before, yes, we are not focused the 5G client application but we do have a few customer interested in the cloud, in the station side. As you know, the 5G bandwidth increased a lot, but the distance becomes shorter. So some -- all of our customers consider, even on the station side, the volume will be higher than 4G. So I'm looking forward to see some contribution starting from later this year on the 5G station. Yes, that's my comment. Yes. For the Q&A, I think you're welcome to raise the question either in English or Mandarin, I think we're welcome to...
Daniel Wang
executiveYes. We can understand Mandarin, no problem.
Johnny Shen
executive[Foreign Language].
Daniel Wang
executiveOkay. Here is a question I think Johnny can have some comments on it. Investors are asking about the Middle East and North America AI market. Can you give us some thoughts about customers and the timing for production and the future outlook for these 2 markets, the Middle East and North America.
Johnny Shen
executiveOkay. Yes, in the Middle East, we are doing a good job. As you know, currently, we are on the NDA, we cannot disclose the customer's name. But I think few famous customer in Israel are our customer. And we've been doing -- and their company are also doing very good. Actually, they have a great exit already. And currently, we have 1 16 -- 2 16-nanometer is ready to production. And in fact, their 7-nanometer design are ongoing, will be tape-out very soon. Yes, we have no problem to serve their -- to continue the service to their mother company. And in fact, the new 7-nanometer design will be tape-out soon. And another big design will be coming. The contract already signed. So Israel, the Middle East area, we're also doing -- in addition to this customer, we have a 2 to 3 additional customer. U.S., I think we already won few -- a few major players for the cloud service are our customer and their product is ready to production. In fact, they already have a small volume production right now. And we are looking forward -- based on their forecast, we are looking forward to have a very reasonable amount of production starting from middle of this year. They will start to make a contribution starting from second half. In parallel, their next-generation is ongoing. We will tape-out before the end of this year. So other accounts, we are also penetrating all the giant company, like I mentioned before, they all know about Alchip. They have a lot of pipeline. So we are looking forward to seek a big contribution from U.S. region. They will well surpass Japan soon and soon they will be the second highest region right behind China.
Daniel Wang
executiveAnd I think this question is also to Johnny. That, in our view, is there any chance that China government to accelerate its demand for CPUs -- for the local CPUs going forward.
Johnny Shen
executiveIn fact, we've been working with our customers very closely. To be honest, our customers are very, very optimistic for their market. And as you know, the mass production, they need to place the order 3 months earlier. So we can easily tell Q1 or Q2. Q3 and Q4 right now, we can -- we don't have a clear picture. But based on their -- the discussion between us, they have a confidence, but they will -- but all the compensation will go back to prior to the Chinese New Year. Right now, I think entire China is suffering about coronavirus prevention. I hope this one will not influence their demand. But overall, for the first half, we already received a solid order from this customer, and the momentum is very, very strong.
Daniel Wang
executiveOkay. Here is a question of asking about 7-nanometer CPU. The one that is scheduled to go into mass production in the later quarter this year. The question is asking this CPU is for server or for PC? So I can answer you. For the CPU, planned to start mass production, late this year should be -- we're seeing a server area, not in the PC MBUs. For the PC and the MBU CPU currently, we're shipping out the products to our China customer [indiscernible]. This product life cycle will be longer than we expected. According to the current plan, the next-generation product will be scheduled to take out maybe by the -- in the second half next year. So we may -- we can only see the production to start maybe near the very year-end of next year, year 2021. So the current generation shipment will last at least 2 years. Okay. Is there any questions, please use the raise hand function of zoom. Or you can send me a message. So far, I guess, we already cover the questions, investors are asking. And again, sorry for inconvenience because of the coronavirus. Okay. People are asking, I guess, these questions should belong to Johnny that investor is asking, 7-nanometer is tight. 7-nano capacity is tight, I think, is tight. How do you get the capacity from TSMC?
Johnny Shen
executiveWell, that's a very good question. Okay. 7-nanometer capacity is very tight. Everybody knows but right now, this year, both the CPU market and also the HPC, majority of our design in production are 16. So I see the insignificant impact on the production revenue in the first half of this year. For second half, we already start to communicate with the TSMC on 7-nanometer capacity. In the past, if we follow the TSMC [indiscernible] to give them 6 months prior forecast ahead, they never fail. But 7-nanometer is -- there is uncertainty. Yes, we can only continuously working with TSMC. And based on the relationship and also past the experience. We should be able to get most of the forecast up. Yes, because all our customers are very big, the major AI user and also the CPU user. So customer and us will work together continuously and also frequently meet with TSMC in order to ensure the capacity.
Daniel Wang
executiveOkay. And another question that I can answer. Some investor is asking about how many customers account for more than 10% of our total revenue in China? There are 2 customers, one, everybody. I guess everybody knows is [indiscernible] and another one, sorry we cannot review the names. We have a very strict NDA. So there are 2 customers. Each account for more than 10% of our total revenue in China. And there is a hand raise question. [ Oli ], your name, I assume its [ Oli ]. I'll unmute you.
Unknown Analyst
analystI'm the Oliver from the [ Brad Rock ]. Can you hear me?
Johnny Shen
executiveYes. Yes. We can hear you.
Unknown Analyst
analystYou just mentioned the 7-nanometer's actually have a lower gross margins than maybe corporate average. So just wondering the reasons for lowering margins because of the higher CapEx tools expense or additional R&D? Or maybe the scale is not sufficient to amortized the expenses. So maybe over time, the margin will get back to the corporate average or even higher. Is it possible -- happens that way?
Daniel Wang
executiveOkay. Oliver, okay. I may need to correct my answer that when we talk about the margin, I assume the mask and IP is the cost -- are the cost. But to our book, as I mentioned, I -- we capitalize mask and IP. So for the milestone when the milestone happens, we recognized the milestone revenue. Most of the time, the revenue -- for the milestone revenue, we have almost 90% to 100% gross margin. And the length, the mask and IP. since they are capitalized, they will go to amortization cost, which is our fixed cost. Usually, we amortize our mask and IP for no longer than 18 months. So why I -- why my answer is the 7-nanometer margin is lower because many people is asking about the margin for different technology node. I can only say under normal situation, if you -- our NRE, our fee, our engineering fee contribution accounts for I would say -- let's say it this way, our engineering efforts, the money we charge accounts for less portion of the total contract value of 7-nanometer. But the amount -- the absolute amount of the effort, the value of the effort is bigger than 16-nanometer or 28-nanometer. So can you understand me?
Unknown Analyst
analystYes, I understood. So let me clarify this. So if -- so after you amortize the IP and tools. And then if we just look at on the financial statements, the margin probably looks similar because of the amortization. Is that right?
Daniel Wang
executiveSorry, I -- Can you repeat?
Unknown Analyst
analystNo, no. I mean the -- if you look at the -- you just mentioned if you just treat IP spending -- expense. And then the margin might be lower in a...
Daniel Wang
executiveMargin rate -- I'm sorry, the margin rate.
Unknown Analyst
analystYes, margin rate might be lower. But the -- But after amortizations, the margin rate might be similar to...
Johnny Shen
executiveIt will be higher.
Unknown Analyst
analystIt will be higher.
Johnny Shen
executiveRight. Oliver, let me expand into this way. Yes, the 7-nanometer, of course, the design effort are higher, entry barrier are higher. So in terms of design fee and also production margin definitely will be higher than 16-nanometer. The reason Daniel mentioned about because there's a huge cost for the mask in IP. Yes, we all know the mask for the -- for 7-nanometer is much, much higher than 16. From majority of a mask fee, we need to pay TSMC. And that mask fee, we have a very limited margin. But for our design and production, if we count out the mask fee, the profit margin and design margin are much higher than 16.
Unknown Analyst
analystI see. I see. Understood...
Johnny Shen
executiveAnd so if the part of a production lasts longer, just like you say, past 18 months, past the older amortization period, all the production volume become very high, and I expect the margin will be also higher.
Daniel Wang
executiveOkay. I don't see other questions, written or hand raising. So if there are no questions, thank you for everyone to join our institutional investment meeting today. And again, sorry for the inconvenience for using this online format for the presentation as long as the coronavirus epidemic getting the situation -- when the situation is getting better, we still prefer face-to-face conference meeting for the future. Thank you, everyone. And then I will stop the connection. And for the whole video and audio, again, we will upload it to the MOPS, [indiscernible]. If you are interesting you can watch the recording. Thank you.
Johnny Shen
executiveOkay. Thank you very much. So the next meeting, we are looking forward to have a face-to-face meeting as usual. Yes. In fact, we really missed the face-to-face private conversation, communication by the end of this meeting. By this time, it's not going to happen. Yes, we won't be able to exchange the business cards as well. But anyway, thank you very much. Thank you.
Daniel Wang
executiveThank you.
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