South Korea’s SK Nexilis Co Ltd, the world’s largest copper foil maker, has established the first green syndicated term loan facility through its Malaysian unit in order to fund the construction of the company’s first overseas factory in Sabah.

The RM2.3 billion copper foil plant, located at the Kota Kinabalu Industrial Park (KKIP), will have an annual production capacity of 50,000 tonnes, which will increase SK Nexilis’ global production capacity by twofold.

The copper foils produced will be exclusively used in electric vehicle batteries, enabling sustainable, low-carbon mobility solutions in various locations, including Korea, Malaysia, Poland, and North America.

SK Nexilis Malaysia Sdn Bhd chief executive officer Shin Dong Hwan said the electrification of motor vehicles is essential for the decarbonisation of the transport sector, which contributes about one-fifth of GHG emissions globally. 

“Our new manufacturing facility will not only facilitate the decarbonisation initiative but also create job opportunities for the local talent network and provide traction for more investments to enhance the local supply chain development for electric vehicles,” he said in a statement.

Shin said the company is deeply heartened to be part of this environmental, social, and governance (ESG) movement with our financial partners as it transitions towards a better, more sustainable future.

“The green loan is the culmination of efforts between SK Nexilis, SKC Co Ltd and SK Group and our relentless commitment towards ESG, as demonstrated by our Net Zero and RE100 initiatives,” he said.

OCBC Bank (Malaysia) Bhd will serve as the mandated lead arranger, facility and security agent, and joint lender.

The bank’s managing director, senior banker, and head of investment banking, Tan Ai Chin, said that Malaysia, being a significant hub for electrical and electronics, is strategically poised to cultivate a robust local electric vehicle manufacturing sector and ecosystem.

She said that SK Nexilis’ presence strengthens this ecosystem and contributes to the country’s initiatives towards decarbonisation.

Source: NST

SK Nexilis debuts green loan to fund RM2.3bil Sabah plant

The Economy Ministry acknowledges the necessity of a collaborative effort involving both the government and the private sector to leverage the potential “tsunami” of investment opportunities, particularly within the semiconductor industry.

Towards this end, its minister Rafizi Ramli invites venture capital (VC) firms and fund managers to contribute to Malaysia’s economic growth in the semiconductor sector by working with Malaysian entrepreneurs to stimulate greater productivity.

Rafizi said the move is timely as it can address concerns about the shortage of high-value and high-return projects in Malaysia, which has led domestic funds to seek investment opportunities abroad.

This trend, according to him, highlights the challenge of domestic direct investment over foreign direct investment (FDI).

Last week, Rafizi received a delegation from Blue Chip Venture Capital (BCVC), led by its chairman and founder Datuk Lai Pin Yong, at his ministry.

BCVC is a specialised fund to tech up and value up the semiconductor industry.

The 80-year-old Lai, a veteran in the semiconductor industry, said the fund aims to “move the needle” within the semiconductor industry, elevating the value chain of the Malaysian semiconductor industry.

Speaking to StarBiz, he said the decoupling of global supply chain from geopolitical events, particularly the China and US trade war, has triggered a wave of inward investment into Malaysia.

“Due to this geopolitical tension, not only Chinese companies but also foreign companies located in China are seeking to relocate outside of China to avoid sanctions from the United States.

“This is a golden opportunity for Malaysia to catch the wave of the industry’s relocation and get the industry going,” he said.

He believes that Malaysia, particularly Penang due to its strong roots in the semiconductor industry, is a preferred option for these companies looking to relocate.

Sharing some insights, he said the local semiconductor industry is witnessing robust interest in three key areas of the value chain — integrated circuit design, advanced packaging, and equipment manufacturing.

Coming back to BCVC, Lai said the fund aims to facilitate companies relocating from China, providing confidence through co-investing.

“The ultimate aim is to encourage these companies to localise and list on the local stock exchange,” he said.

According to him, this model represents a departure from traditional approaches, which often involve foreign companies operating somewhat independently from the local economy, using the host country’s land, water and electricity and cheaper labour to make products for export.

These are important but need to go further, he added.

“We need to deepen the collaboration where FDI becomes ingrained in the fabric of Malaysian business, committing to talent development and building up the local supply system, thereby contributing to long-term economic development and growth.”

Source: The Star

BCVC looks to elevate semiconductor industry

Productivity with the help of artificial intelligence (AI) will be a major trend in the coming year as industries see the amount of work being created exceeding the number of people able to do the job.

Corey Sanders, corporate vice-president of Microsoft Cloud for Industry, tells Digital Edge that AI presents an opportunity for workers to focus on their tasks and be more productive.

According to the Microsoft Work Trend Index 2023, some 62% of Malaysians are worried that AI will replace their jobs. However, 84% said they would delegate as much work as possible to AI to reduce their workload.

“The ability to bring productivity to every facet of work, whether it is things like email, sales, across manufacturing lines or construction efforts, productivity is possible to improve with AI in pretty much every line of work. I think Malaysia is an even more opportune location than other places in the world for that impact,” says Sanders.

“Customers and individuals in general are beginning to understand AI more and more every day, and our focus is to empower individuals and corporations to do more. AI is becoming a component of most, if not all, applications and people are seeing it in their daily life.”

Microsoft 365, a product family of productivity software and collaboration and cloud-based services, and GitHub, a software development and version control platform and cloud-based service, allow developers to store and manage their software code. These are significant tools that allow the Copilot experience and the companies’ customers have experienced a massive improvement in productivity, says Sanders.

Microsoft unveiled new products at the Microsoft Ignite event in mid-November last year, focusing on trying to get AI into smaller businesses and more organisations, in addition to enabling the technology in larger companies. The cloud is one way to democratise AI as it has the ability to build and deploy applications within hours, says Sanders.

“It doesn’t matter how big you are. As a company, you can benefit. But it will likely take time to be able to develop in smaller organisations,” he adds.

“This is where, when we look at opportunities, we look at skilling and enabling country-based skilling enhancements to train the broader population on these technologies, trends and solutions. I think a big area of focus is that we have to be able to try and push a more democratised solution.”

Talent will be the primary focus

Having the right understanding and skills to manage AI tools will be critical in the coming year. Sanders says while the AI revolution is exciting, it is a big change to what the current user experience is and how data is used.

This is why Microsoft is focused on enabling skilling at a country level. “Skilling and skill set development will be a big challenge, like any other technological trend,” he says.

Data scientist continues to be one of the hottest new jobs in this landscape because of AI development, and AI-prompt and developer experience will be critical factors. Sanders emphasises that data will drive all of the AI experiences.

“Being able to deliver data in a unified way [will be important] and Microsoft Fabric is geared towards that, which is going to take data experts [to operate]. Data engineers and data scientists will continue to be very sought after by corporations, perhaps even more.”

Microsoft Fabric is an all-in-one analytics solution for enterprises that covers everything from data movement to data science, real-time analytics and business intelligence.

AI ethics to be front and centre

Security and a focus on responsible AI to make sure companies secure their data and solutions are important and critical issues moving forward. Sanders says larger organisations already have more resources built in to support that but small organisations may not.

This is where the company focuses on its security product lines to be able to deliver easy-to-use security solutions for small and medium corporations. “Depending on the company, sovereignty may be an important area of focus. Certainly, government-based companies would have concerns or questions about data sovereignty, using the AI model and how that data is used as part of the AI model,” he says.

“This is where we try to be clear, from an AI perspective, that customer data is customer data and we don’t use it to train large foundation models. We focus on solutions to enable sovereignty and residency of data.”

A key aspect for organisations is about building the right principles and governance policy around this, making sure they understand what they are building and why they are building it. Sanders says the company shares with customers how it puts in place governance policies that they can use or borrow to build their own, including things like safety and inclusiveness.

“The organisations will then be able to apply these principles and policies when testing or building an AI solution. And it meets their expectations. That’s when it is truly inclusive,” he says.

“They also need good auditing and monitoring measures to make sure that once the solution is live, they are able to ensure it continues to live up to their expectations and requirements.

“In the next six months, I think we will see a massive outpouring of new solutions in the market that are built on Microsoft, that are not necessarily built by Microsoft.”

Source: The Edge Malaysia

Productivity and talent development will be key to the future of AI

The manufacturing sector may have bottomed out with the improvement in January signalling the start of a gradual recovery in Malaysia’s overall industrial production, industry observers said.

They said the country’s Industrial Production Index (IPI) is expected to gradually improve in the upcoming months, driven by semiconductor sales and a favourable comparison base.

Bank Muamalat Malaysia Bhd chief economist Dr Mohd Afzanizam Abdul Rashid believes that the IPI will gradually improve, especially for semiconductor-related products, as this year’s global semiconductor sales are expected to increase by 13.1 per cent. 

However, he noted that the main factor dragging the IPI down in December 2023 is the manufacturing sector, which accounted for the lion’s share of 68.25 per cent of the total IPI.

“The manufacturing sector output fell 1.4 per cent year-on-year (YoY) in December (Nov: -0.1 per cent) with export-oriented industries (45.8 per cent of total IPI) declined 4.1 per cent from 2.7 per cent drop and it has been on negative print for seven months in a row.

“This shows that weak global demand has taken a toll on the IPI,” he told Business Times.

Going forward, Afzanizam said the risks for Malaysia’s IPI performance hinge upon the potential decline in global gross domestic product (GDP) and the risk of recession in the global economy, especially in major economies.

He said it seems that China is struggling to sustain its growth with deflationary risks have been growing given the recent the negative consumer price index (CPI) print which has been an ongoing affair for four consecutive months. 

“Not to mention disruption is supply chains following the heightened geopolitical risks. So, risks to lower IPI is very externally driven.  I believe that some strategies that Malaysia can adopt to boost its IPI performance include promoting domestic growth. 

“Therefore, implementing the 2024 Budget initiatives as soon as possible is crucial to offset weaknesses from abroad,” he added.

Echoing similar views, Tradeview Capital fund manager Neoh Jia Man believes that the IPI performance will gradually pick up towards the end of 2024, thanks to a low comparison base. 

The improvement in January’s manufacturing PMI also indicates that the manufacturing sector might have bottomed, he added.

“The recent decline in Dec 2023 IPI was due to lower manufacturing production, which was widely believed to be the result of waning export demand. 

“The figure was below consensus expectation and does not bode well for the outlook of Malaysia export-oriented counters, particularly those in the electrical and electronics, as well as petroleum and chemical products industries,” he noted.

Nevertheless, Neoh opined that the upcoming US presidential election could potentially pose challenges to Malaysian industrial players if there are any changes in US trade policy, alongside the persistent external headwinds arising from a weak Chinese economy. 

However, he believes that the New Industrial Masterplan 2030, launched by the Malaysian government last year, has already laid out the necessary routes toward strengthening the competitiveness of our nation’s manufacturing prowess. 

“Nonetheless, execution remains the key variable that will determine its success,” he said.

Meanwhile, KAF Investment Bank Bhd said looking ahead, ongoing robust domestic demand and a steady recovery in global demand is expected to lift industrial activities from its current low levels. 

The firm noted that the S&P Global Malaysia Manufacturing PMI, an early gauge of manufacturing performance, rose to a 16-month high of 49.0 in January 2024 (December 2023: 47.9), with the moderation in output, new orders and exports easing. 

“Overall, manufacturers’ sentiment in Malaysia has improved slightly from December, signalling that the worst of the slowdown seen in 2023 has passed,” it said in a note.

Likewise, Kenanga Research expects the manufacturing sector’s recovery to pick up pace, particularly in the second half of 2024, driven by the technology upcycle and China’s gradual post-pandemic recovery.

The firm also expects 2024 GDP growth to expand further to 4.9 percent, alongside a resilient services sector backed by an increase in tourist arrivals.

Source: NST

Industrial production on recovery

The Selangor economy is growing according to planned and is expected to continue to improve with the implementation of various initiatives by the state administration, said Ng Sze Han.

The state executive councillor for investment, trade and mobility said that some of the efforts include providing the on-demand transit van service or demand-responsive transit (DRT) and the development of the Selangor Aerospace Park (SAP), involving 2,000 acres of land in Sepang.

He said several programmes developed by the Selangor Information Technology and Digital Economy Corporation (Sidec) would also ensure high-income job opportunities.

“By connecting these three main elements, the Selangor economy will be guided in the right and better direction,” he said in a video on Facebook in conjunction with the Chinese New Year celebration.

This year, Selangor is targeting an investment value of up to RM50 billion, an increase of RM5 billion compared to the previous year, driven by economic development and the opening of all sectors.

From January to June last year, Selangor approved 657 investment projects in the manufacturing and services sectors involving a total investment value of RM29.72 billion.

Source: Selangor Journal

Aerospace park development, transit van service support state economic growth — Exco

Automation and digitalisation, along with Malaysia’s economic shift towards high value-added industries, continue to benefit Honeywell, an American multinational corporation with a Southeast Asian headquarters in Kuala Lumpur.

Lim Yeong Chuan, the country president of Honeywell for Malaysia and Singapore, said: “Honeywell is an integrated operating company serving a broad range of industries around the world. Our business is aligned with three powerful megatrends — automation, the future of aviation and energy transition — underpinned by our Honeywell Accelerator operating system and Honeywell Connected Enterprise integrated software platform.

“As a trusted partner, we help organisations solve the world’s toughest, most complex challenges, providing actionable solutions and innovations that help make the world smarter, safer and more sustainable.

“Honeywell has innovative technologies to support Malaysia’s National Energy Transition Roadmap and Hydrogen Economy and Technology Roadmap.

“We are excited that Parliament passed the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Bill 2023 last year. These ambitious decarbonisation targets will require the best technologies to track, control and abate carbon intensity while powering the growth of the economy.”

In 2022, Honeywell signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with Petroliam Nasional Bhd (Petronas) for strategic sustainability, digitalisation and carbon-neutral energy initiatives.

Their partnership aims to address key objectives across four domains: digital transformation, sustainability and emissions management, cybersecurity and leadership and capability development.

Lim said these solutions supported Petronas’ growth strategy and low-carbon agenda by employing Honeywell technologies for productivity, carbon capture and utilisation, energy storage and digital twins.

Honeywell has also signed an MoU of business exploration with UEM Edgenta Bhd to bring technologies and solutions to smart cities, renewable energy and energy efficiency across Malaysia.

Examples of technologies and digital solutions from Honeywell are battery and energy storage systems, supervisory control and data acquisition, energy management systems, smart city technologies, energy and waste management solutions, and sustainable and intelligent buildings.

Honeywell is a subsidiary of Honeywell International headquartered in North Carolina, with about 99,000 employees worldwide.

In financial year 2022, Honeywell International reported US$35.5 billion in sales.

Honeywell began operating in Malaysia in 1985 via MK Electric, with a facility in Shah Alam.

The company further strengthened its presence in the region by establishing its Asean headquarters in Greater Kuala Lumpur (Greater KL) in 2017.

It also operates two cutting-edge manufacturing facilities in Penang, supplying to local and international markets.

Greater KL was chosen as Honeywell’s regional headquarters due to its location in the centre of Southeast Asia and its multicultural environment.

InvestKL chief executive officer Datuk Muhammad Azmi Zulkifli said: “Honeywell’s decision to establish its presence in Greater KL speaks volumes about the strategic advantages this region offers. Our supportive government policies, forward-looking initiatives and a pool of diverse, highly skilled talents position Greater KL as a hub for innovative technology solutions. We are proud to have played a role in bringing Honeywell here, further enhancing Malaysia’s position on the global tech map.”

Honeywell also operates two specialised sites around Greater KL for staging and distributing aviation components.

“Our Southeast Asian operations are part of Honeywell’s high-growth region portfolio for emerging markets, which include China, India, Central and Eastern Europe, the Middle East, Central Asia, Africa and Latin America,” he said.

Through investments in education, the company is actively promoting diversity and talent development in Malaysia.

“We work with local suppliers, enhance the Malaysian workforce’s skills and advocate for the adoption of proven global technologies.”

Lim said Honeywell welcomed Malaysia’s growth agenda by collaborating with government entities, small and medium enterprises, suppliers and key stakeholders to address rising needs for energy efficiency, sustainability, safety and productivity.

He believes that Southeast Asia will continue to urbanise and require more sophisticated infrastructure.

These trends aligned with Honeywell’s growth themes in sustainability, digitalisation and green buildings, he said.

Source: NST

Honeywell benefits from strategic plans

Graphjet Technology Sdn Bhd, a green graphite producer, is eyeing a Nasdaq debut with a US$1.49bil pro forma enterprise value following the approval of its de-SPAC transaction by the Securities and Exchange Commission of the United States.

Graphjet said the development is a milestone in its journey towards becoming a publicly traded entity.

A de-SPAC is a process that enables a privately held operating company to become public by merging with an already-public shell company known as a special-purpose acquisition company or SPAC.

Following the merger’s completion, the operating company becomes public and can use the dissolved shell company’s capital.In a statement yesterday, its co-founder and chief executive officer Aiden Lee Ping Wei said the company’s success is rooted in continuous innovation especially in green technology. 

Source: Bernama

Graphjet Technology is eyeing Nasdaq listing

Malaysia’s manufacturing sector is expected to see a robust recovery in the second half of 2024 (2H24), and the manufacturing index is forecasted to expand 4.6 per cent this year, said Kenanga Investment Bank Bhd (KIB).

In a note, it said the manufacturing sector’s recovery will be driven by the technology upcycle in 2H24 and China’s gradual post-pandemic recovery.

“The bank also expects the gross domestic product (GDP) growth to expand further to 4.9 per cent this year.

“We maintain our GDP growth projection for the fourth quarter (4Q) of 2023 at 3.7 per cent compared to 3.4 per cent advance estimates by the Department of Statistics Malaysia (DOSM),” it said.

Meanwhile, in a separate note, Public Investment Bank Bhd anticipates improved growth prospects for the industrial sector in 2024.

The research said in 2023, the manufacturing and mining sectors demonstrated modest expansions of 0.7 per cent and 0.8 per cent, respectively, while the electricity sector experienced a growth rate of 2.5 per cent.

“The manufacturing sector declined to 1.4 per cent year-on-year in December compared to 0.1 per cent in November. Meanwhile, the electricity sector grew by 4.6 per cent in December compared to 4.3 per cent in November,” said the research house.

Source: Bernama

Manufacturing sector to see robust recovery in second half of 2024

VIENNA-listed AT&S Austria Technologie & Systemtechnik AG is poised to start producing high-end integrated circuit (IC) substrates at its new facility in Kulim Hi-Tech Park, Kedah, by the end of this year.

For a start, the serial production of the cutting-edge IC substrates will cater almost exclusively to US semiconductor giant Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD) for incorporation into its high-performance and energy-efficient data centre processors.

In an exclusive interview with The Edge — a day before the official opening ceremony of the AT&S Campus, which houses its manufacturing facility and office building in Kulim, on Jan 24 — AT&S CEO Andreas Gerstenmayer emphasises the importance of IC substrates, highlighting their often underestimated role in microprocessors, as well as the intricacies of the production process.

The 59-year-old German says AT&S introduced front-end technology in the area of IC substrate manufacturing to Malaysia. This is expected to complement the nation’s strength in back-end assembly over the past five decades and elevate its standing in the electrical and electronics (E&E) value chain.

“Malaysia has been very strong in the area of back-end semiconductor assembly. You get all the components in, from silicon to substrates, you package them and you ship them.

“But with AT&S coming to Kulim, we will be producing IC substrates here. So, this is something quite different for Malaysia because your country will now be involved in not just the back-end packaging, but also the production of substrates for packaging,” Gerstenmayer states.

While some companies had produced substrates in Malaysia in the past, he believes their products were not as sophisticated as the ones to be made by AT&S.

“What we are making are really high-end IC substrates for big names like AMD. About 10 years ago, AT&S was the first company to bring such technology to China. And today, we are the first ones to do it in Malaysia. So, we know how to do it.

“AMD is a very important client of ours. The IC substrates that we craft for AMD in Kulim will be sent to the outsourced semiconductor assembly and test (Osat) providers and they will do the back-end activities,” he explains.

Founded in 1987, the Leoben-headquartered AT&S is the world’s second-largest high-end printed circuit board (PCB) producer and fifth-largest IC substrates manufacturer. It serves industries such as consumer electronics, computers, communications, semiconductors, automotive, aviation, industrial and medical.

In addition to the state-of-the-art facility it is building in Kulim, AT&S also has a presence in Nanjangud, India; Chongqing and Shanghai in China; and Ansan, South Korea. The planned investment under Phase 1 of the Kulim project is €1.7 billion (about RM8.7 billion) and to date, AT&S has invested over €1 billion.

Notably, the Kulim plant is the group’s largest investment thus far in terms of initial investment for a single project. It is also the biggest single investment ever made by an Austrian company in Malaysia.

Gerstenmayer says following the completion of AT&S’ new Malaysian headquarters and Plant 1 in Kulim, which will focus on the production of IC substrates, there will be a lot of synergy and spillover effects that will complete Malaysia’s E&E ecosystem.

“We have heard from others that some corporations are planning to bring up their front-end factories in Malaysia. By having a more complete supply chain in your country, there will be material suppliers and maintenance service providers coming here,” he elaborates.

Gerstenmayer says AT&S has been very happy with its investments in Kulim so far.

“Our strategic decision in 2021 to choose Malaysia for our first facility in Southeast Asia was absolutely correct. Back then, we realised that AT&S already had a strong footprint in China. As a group, we knew it was not wise to put all our eggs in one basket. So, if we were to make another major investment, it would be somewhere else. And that somewhere else is now in Malaysia.

“Today, our office building and Plant 1 are open. In Plant 1, AT&S will produce technology for AMD. Plant 2 is wind and water tight; as soon as the market environment for one of our main customers has improved, we will bring the second plant online,” he says.

Construction work on the plant started in November 2021 and commercial operations are targeted to come onstream before the end of this year.

The first phase of the Kulim project is expected to create 6,000 jobs, including for 4,500 blue-collar workers. The group, which operates seven plants in Europe and Asia, currently has 14,000 employees worldwide.

Together with the plants in Chongqing and a new research and production (R&D) centre in Leoben, which will also open by year end, AT&S’ Kulim plant is expected to secure global growth for the group, as well as raise the importance of its sites in Austria.

IC substrates provide connections between silicon dies and PCBs. They are composed of several layers and a supporting core in the middle, and contain drill holes and conductor paths that exceed the density of conventional PCBs. They are used for cloud edge computing, data centres and server farms as well as for consumer devices.

Last November, AT&S announced that the group would be providing IC substrates to AMD. The substrates produced by AT&S are an integral part of AMD’s data centre processors that power digital experiences such as artificial intelligence and virtual reality.

Gerstenmayer says IC substrates are “probably one of the most underestimated components” in microprocessors. AT&S is a leader in embedding microchips and components that regulate the associated power and information flows into monolithic systems that make sure that the pathways stay as short as possible, so information can travel at maximum speed without any significant losses.

“Without IC substrates, the interconnectivity won’t work. Today, in a digital society, all of us are using electronic devices and the internet, so we generate a lot of data every day. We need to manage, transmit and store the data.

“Data and microelectronics are crucial in digitalising our whole society, and AT&S is part of that ecosystem because our products are embedded into the semiconductor chips. We are really proud to have customers like AMD in our client portfolio and we appreciate its trust,” he says.

Gerstenmayer says AT&S is in the midst of bringing in more equipment to Kulim as production lines are being installed.

“This is a very intense process because the production of IC substrates involves more than 200 process steps. All of them interact with and impact each other. If we want to achieve a really good level of quality and yield, all the core equipment that we are bringing in from Japan, South Korea, Germany and the US need to fit together and harmonise nicely.”

AMD: We can be a demanding customer

In a pre-recorded video message played during the opening ceremony of AT&S Campus, AMD chair and CEO Lisa Su Tzwu-Fang says the Austrian firm has built “an incredible factory” in Kulim.

She adds that AT&S’ operation in Malaysia has the potential to become “a key location” for AMD’s manufacturing and development.

“We are excited that Malaysia will now play an important role within AMD’s supply chain as the new AT&S Campus provides industry-need IC substrates for our most advanced products.

“At AMD, we are all about enabling high-performance data computing to solve the world’s most important challenges. The IC substrates to be produced by AT&S here (in Kulim) will enable AMD to achieve our vision. The substantial investments that AT&S is making also ensure that the future remains bright for our partnership,” she states.

Meanwhile, AMD corporate vice-president for manufacturing Scott Aylor says he is convinced that AT&S will be the perfect additional source of high-quality IC substrates for its data centres.

“AT&S is an Austrian company with a global scale. It could serve our needs in Europe and China. And obviously, we were very excited to hear that it is expanding into Malaysia.

“To be honest, AMD can be a very challenging and demanding customer, but AT&S has steadfastly kept its commitment to us, and punctually delivered a plant that fully met our expectations,” he adds.

AT&S’ top and bottom line have been growing steadily over the past three financial years.

The group’s revenue grew from €1 billion in the financial year ended March 31, 2020 (FY2020) to €1.2 billion in FY2021, before increasing further to €1.6 billion in FY2022 and hitting a new record high of €1.8 billion (RM9.3 billion) in FY2023.

Its earnings also jumped from €19.8 million in FY2020 to €47.4 million in FY2021, before gaining further to €103.3 million in FY2022 and €136.6 million in FY2023.

Despite the challenging global economic situation and volatility in the market, Gerstenmayer says the progress of the production capacity expansion in Kulim and the expansion of the site in Leoben remain positive.

As such, he says, the group’s revenue guidance of about €3.5 billion by FY2027 “is still intact”.

Dörflinger Private Foundation and Androsch Private Foundation are AT&S’ two largest shareholders, with an 18% and 17.5% stake respectively.

Over the past 12 months, shares of AT&S have declined by 29% to €23.30 at the time of writing last Thursday, giving it a market capitalisation of €905.2 million.

Gerstenmayer believes the global semiconductor industry has seen the bottom of the downcycle.

“The slowdown started in 2022, and it has been quite a while already. As far as AT&S is concerned, we continue to observe the supply chain situation. The expectation now is that the industry should recover by the second half of 2024. We are ready to go. We will have everything in place,” he concludes. 

Source: The Edge Malaysia

Tech: AT&S’ deal with AMD to help elevate Malaysia’s E&E value chain