Integrated Micro-Electronics Inc. (IMI), one of the leading worldwide providers of electronics manufacturing services (EMS) and power semiconductor assembly and test services, announced 2015 revenues of $814.4 million or P37 billion, net income of $28.8 million or P1.3 billion (the same as last year’s), and return on common equity of 12.1 percent. The announcement was made during IMI’s annual stockholders’ meeting this morning at its headquarters in Binan, Laguna.
IMI chairman Jaime Augusto Zobel de Ayala said, “IMI continuously reinvents itself and remains resilient amidst the volatility of the global electronics industry. Despite an uncertain year for currency markets, made more challenging by the ongoing economic slowdown in China, IMI remained committed to delivering differentiated solutions to enable its customers to shape and service the industries they operate in.”
He added, “More recently, IMI has aggressively grown its high-value segments within the automotive, industrial, and medical industries, as it broadened its product offerings in those spaces.”
Arthur Tan, IMI president and chief executive officer, echoed what the chairman said: “Our 2015 performance demonstrated the resilience of our business. The subdued global economy, the volatile foreign currency markets, and the ongoing economic slowdown in China created a highly uncertain context for business.”
“Excluding the impact of changes in currency exchange, total revenues would have been higher by 2 percent,” added Tan.
Robust automotive and industrial business
“We aggressively shifted our focus and resources on the automotive and industrial segments because these are fast-growing and high-margin businesses that will further strengthen our position,” said Tan.
The automotive segment comprises 43 percent of IMI’s revenues.
Tan said that the company’s automotive business grew by 9 percent in 2015. He noted that the euro fell to its lowest level against the dollar in 12 years, tempering the gains from IMI’s growing automotive business in Bulgaria. “Excluding currency impact, the revenues from automotive would have been higher by 22 percent compared to last year,” added Tan.
IMI increased its automotive camera revenues by 66 percent in 2015. “During the year, we also celebrated an important milestone of shipping our one millionth forward-facing camera to a leading tier 1 automotive supplier for their suite of driver assistance functions. Nobody else in our industry has done that in this scale, and this is where we will raise the bar and be ahead of the curve,” said Tan.
A total of 21 new customers of IMI entered mass production in 2015. Further, IMI won 207 new projects (from either new customers or new divisions or models from existing customers), up from 155 in 2014.
More than 85 percent of the newly awarded projects are for automotive and industrial customers.
Continuous innovation
“We have recently launched a new division—the Insulated Gate Bipolar Transistor (IGBT) Power Module—in the Philippines,” said Tan.
IGBT modules are terminal power semiconductor devices used as electric switches that combine high efficiency and fast switching for applications that include automotive, energy, and industrial.
Tan added, “We are the only local integrated power module line in the Philippines with the capability to not only do packaging but also the development of customized testers and test systems. Other companies can only package and wait for their customers to provide them the testers.”
Research by IHS shows that the power module market will be worth $8 billion by 2020 with annual growth rates of around 8 percent.
The thriving demand from consumer electronics sector, the shift to electric vehicles and hybrid electric vehicles, and the deployment of smart grid are just a few of the market drivers that will boost the IGBT market in the next five years, according to Research and Markets.
IMI’s Design and Development Group (D&D) continues to provide product development services to IMI’s customers in identified market areas. A significant number of samples of its latest automotive cameras have been distributed and are currently undergoing evaluation by automotive tier 1 suppliers and original equipment manufacturers.
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