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An employee walks past an ASML logo, a Dutch company which is currently the largest supplier in the world of semiconductor manufacturing machines via photolithography systems in Veldhoven on April 17, 2018. They call it “the shrink” — it’s the challenge of how to pack more information onto the microchips which power everything from our phones to our computers, even our coffee machines. And pushing today’s boundaries of science and technology is the Dutch company ASML, which since its foundation in 1984 has quietly become a world leader in the semiconductor business. / AFP PHOTO / EMMANUEL DUNANDEMMANUEL DUNAND/AFP/Getty Images
emmanuel dunand/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images
ASML Holding NV said Wednesday that net profit for the second quarter rose sharply, driven by higher sales, and that its growth outlook for 2020 remains unchanged relative to the start of the year despite the coronavirus pandemic.
The Dutch maker of semiconductor equipment ASML, -2.88% ASML, +2.11% made a quarterly net profit of 751 million euros ($856.2 million) compared with EUR476 million for the year-earlier period.
Net sales for the second quarter rose to EUR3.33 billion from EUR2.57 billion a year before, ASML said. The company had previously said revenue it wasn’t able to recognize in the first quarter would shift to the second and third quarters.
ASML shipped nine extreme ultraviolet lithography, or EUV, systems–its most advanced technology–in the quarter. The company said its operational capabilities are now largely back to normal.
The company, which hadn’t provided guidance for the second quarter in light of uncertainty caused by the pandemic, said it expects sales for the third quarter to be between EUR3.6 billion and EUR3.8 billion, with a gross margin of between 47% and 48%. In the second quarter, ASML’s gross margin was 48.2%.
“Our 2020 growth expectations are largely unchanged relative to our view at the start of the year,” ASML President and Chief Executive Peter Wennink said.
ASML said it has agreed to acquire Berliner Glas, a privately held manufacturer of ceramic and optical modules. Financial details of the deal won’t be disclosed, it said.
