IQE on a roll

Compound semiconductor wafer supplier IQE is on a sharp growth curve having achieved a market share of over 50% following a £50 million supply contract signed this month.

“We are excited by the market developments that are leading to the increasing deployment of compound semiconductor solutions across a range of applications, and that consequently offer potential for IQE to deliver continued steady growth as a result of the Group’s unique position in the Compound Semiconductor materials marketplace,” says Dr Drew Nelson, CEO of IQE.

IQE has moved its solar compound photovoltaic technology from the development stage into pilot production and received initial orders for the technology in Q4.

Revenue for 2014 is expected to be approximately £112 million with H2 revenues of about £60 million.

EBITDA is expected to be up by about 8% year on year at approximately £27 million following a second half EBITDA of approximately £16 million.

Net debt fell from £34 million to £31 million in the course of the year despite restructuring costs of £5 million. Further reductions of net debt are expected during 2015.

IQE sells into the wireless communications market and into consumer and industrial applications using advanced photonic lasers and sensors, high resolution infrared systems, advanced solar power (CPV), high efficiency LED lighting, and efficient power switching.

80% of IQE’s sales are coming from the mobile sector which is expected to show further strong growth driven by the proliferation of increasingly complex wireless communication devices and systems such as LTE/4G, dual band WiFi, and GPS location devices, which require increasingly complex compound semiconductor solutions.

IQE’s photonics business grew 20% in the year and now accounts for 14% of the business driven by thev deployment of high capacity optical data transmission and storage.

IQE’s infrared business won an order in October 2014 for $1.1 million and another in January 2015 for $3.25 million.

Significant progress has been made in IQE’s Gallium Nitride technology platforms, particularly for base station and power switching applications and a major supply relationship with MACOM has been signed.

‘We are working with leading silicon chip companies and on a number of major government-funded programmes to develop the next generation of technology which will combine the scale and maturity of the silicon industry with the advanced properties of compound semiconductors,’ says IQE,

david manners

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