MKS Instruments, Inc. Price & Performance (MKSI)

During the call, we will be discussing various non GAAP financial measures. Unless otherwise noted, all income statement related financial measures will be non GAAP other than revenue. Please refer to our press release and the presentation materials posted to the Investor Relations sections of our website for information regarding our non GAAP financial results, and a reconciliation to our GAAP measures. Our investor website also provides a detailed breakout of revenues by end market and division. Now, I'll turn the call over to John Peritosh, and good morning, everyone. Before I discuss our quarterly results, I'd like to take a moment to review 2024, which was a year of impressive Despite roughly flat year over year revenue of $360,000,000,0.0 we achieved a 190 basis point expansion gross margin. We managed our operating expenses effectively increased earnings per share by 49% and improved free cash flow by $178,000,000 Additionally, we took several actions to proactively manage our leverage, and significantly reduce our interest expense. This included an upsized $140,000,000,0.0 convertible note offering, voluntary prepayments of $4.26,000,000 dollars on our term loan and an opportunistic refinancing and repricing. Of our term loans. We took these steps while also maintaining investments in R and D, and strategic initiatives including delivering technology innovations in areas such as world class optics, lasers and laser systems, and new chemistry solutions for advanced packaging, in the AI era.

We also upgraded and expanded our operations in Romania broke ground on our new supercenter factory in Malaysia and purchased the site in Thailand for a future chemistry factory [indiscernible] These investments add capacity and resiliency to our manufacturing footprint. We're proud of our accomplishments in 2024 and I want to acknowledge our teams across MKS, who delivered these results despite muted end markets. I also want to thank our customers across our semiconductor, electronics and packaging, and specialty industrial markets for their support and engagement As we work to deliver unique solutions that enable their success.

And deepest product portfolios that uniquely allow us to solve our customers' most complex challenges. These challenges are placing increasing pressure on traditional Moore's Law innovation cycles. MKS enabling solutions to this more than more environment through design and production wins in areas like optical modules for the lithography, metrology and inspection market lasers for next generation back end applications, and chemistry equipment for multi layer substrates for advanced AI servers. These examples demonstrate the impact technological innovations have on our industry and we believe our position as a foundational enabler across semiconductors and electronics sets us up well as these trends accelerate. Now let's discuss our results in more detail. Ended 2024 on a strong note with revenue Gross margin and earnings per diluted share above the midpoint of our guidance ranges.

Revenue was up 5% year over year driven by double digit growth in both our Electronics and Packaging and semiconductor end markets. We continue to make good progress proactively managing our leverage. Including another successful repricing of our term loans and $100,000,000 voluntary principal prepayment in January 2025. Combined with similar actions we took in 2024, and a slight improvement in the interest rate environment, have reduced our annual interest expense run rate by over $130,000,000 compared to the prior year. Looking at our performance in our 3 end markets.

Starting with our semiconductor market, Revenue increased 6% sequentially. Above the high end of our guidance range. Similar to the trends seen throughout the year, this higher revenue trend was mainly driven by better than anticipated in quarter demand, primarily related to DRAM and logic foundry applications, for our vacuum product offerings. NAND has picked up from but remains at historically low levels. We are well positioned for both upgrade activity as customers move to higher layer counts and potential new greenfield investments, when that market recovers.

We are achieving a healthy pace of design wins that create great opportunities for us when semiconductor investment recovers.

Including reactive gas solutions for leading edge nodes, Additionally, we continue to advance our positions in lithography, metrology and inspection, with another design win supplying optical assemblies a leading customer.

We also maintained our momentum in the back end more orders for our lasers during the quarter, We have continued to invest in our laser business over the years and we believe we are well positioned for strong growth. In the we expect semiconductor revenue to be flattish The guidance demonstrates continued stability DRAM and foundry logic demand with NAND remaining at low levels.

Overall, while demand remains low, it is higher than a year ago. Investments we're making along with our design wins strengthen our confidence and our ability to outperform as the market recovery gains momentum. Turning to Electronics and Packaging.

Revenue grew 10% sequentially and above the high end of our guidance. The sequential increase was driven by increased equipment sales, We saw continued momentum in orders for our chemistry and equipment solutions for advanced MLB HDI and packaged substrates related to AI applications. This shows the key role our products and technologies play as advanced packaging, and specifically the interconnect becomes more critical in enabling the manufacturing of increasingly complex electronic devices. Excluding the impact of FX and palladium pass through, sales of chemistry increased 9% in the over the prior year.

For the full year, chemistry sales finished up 12% significantly outperformed the PCB industry in 2024.

Looking ahead to we expect revenue from our electronics and to be down 4% on a sequential basis, primarily due to seasonality associated with the Lunar New Year. [indiscernible] In our specialty industrial market, revenues decreased 2% sequentially and was at the lower end of our guidance range. While the Life and Health Sciences and Research and Defense end markets were steady, We saw softness across the broader industrial market. As a reminder, our specialty industrial market consists of a variety of applications across multiple end markets. Looking ahead to we expect revenue in our Specialty Industrial market to decline 6% from mainly due to softness in the industrial market and Lunar New Year impacts especially related to our general metal finishing business. Overall, we executed well delivered solid financial performance in the and full year 2024. With Green Shoots emerging in a few key areas of our business, and improving profitability, MKS enters 2025 in a robust financial position. I mentioned the strength of our team earlier. Their efforts coupled with our dynamic culture are reflected in the industry accolades we for the second consecutive year, were named to U. S. News and World Report's Best Companies to Work for in our Industry.

As well as named by Newsweek and Statista as 1 of America's most responsible companies for 2025.

Now let me turn it over to Ram to run through the financial results and guidance in more detail. Thank you, John, and good morning, everyone. As I've had a few months now to dive deeper into my role, I'm impressed with the level of execution that MKS delivers.

Especially in light of the industry demand backdrop over the past couple of years. In the coming quarters, we will maintain our focus and discipline on managing costs while we make the necessary investments for long term growth and business continuity. I will talk a little more about how we are looking at the coming quarters in a moment, but first, let me review our and full year performance in detail. For the NKS reported revenue of 935000004% sequentially and 5% year over year, The result was above the midpoint of our guidance range and was driven mainly by better than expected semiconductor MKS and electronics and packaging revenue, semiconductor revenue was $400,000,000 up 6% sequentially and 10% year over year. The result was above the high end of our expectation as our team continued to execute on strong in quarter demand especially as related to DRAM and logic Foundry applications where we have seen relative normalization of inventory levels [indiscernible] NAND is bouncing off very low base but we are seeing evidence that we are making good progress in burning through inventory at some customers. Electronics and packaging revenue was $2.54,000,000 dollars dollars an increase of 10% quarter over quarter and also above the high end of our expectations.

This result was led by higher flexible PCB drilling and chemistry equipment sales partially offset by normal seasonal declines in chemistry.

On a year over year basis, sales were up 13% driven by stronger performance in chemistry flexible drilling equipment, and Chemistry Equipment. Chemistry sales were up 9% excluding the impact of FX and palladium pass through continuing a gradual recovery trend from the industry wide softness. In our specialty industry markets, revenue was $2.81,000,000 dollars a decline of 2% sequentially and below our guidance midpoint largely due to softness across the broader industrial markets. Revenue was down 8% year over year basis also primarily due to softness in the industrial market. The prior year result benefited from strong chemistry equipment sales within the general metal finishing business. Turning to gross margin, we reported gross margin of 47.2% which is above the midpoint of our guidance. Gross margin was down sequentially due to higher equipment mix in the and consistent with our expectations. We continue to prudently manage our costs balancing investing in our business with near term profitability and cash generation. Operating expenses were $2.42,000,000 and within our guidance range. Operating income was nearly $200,000,000 yielding an operating margin of 21.3% and above our guidance driven mostly by higher gross profit. Adjusted EBITDA was $2.37,000,000 dollars and also above the midpoint of our expectations yielding a 25.3% margin.

Net interest expenses was 45,000,000 lower than our guidance of $48,000,000 as a result of a year to date reclass of approximately $3,000,000 of pension plan interest costs to other non operating expenses. Net interest expenses was otherwise in line with our guidance. The effective tax rate was 4% which was lower than our guidance due to certain favorable discrete items in the quarter. Net earnings Operating performance and lower income taxes I just detailed. For the fourth quarter, free cash flow was $125,000,000 or 13% of revenue. We recorded capital expenditures of $51,000,000 in the quarter slightly above 5% of revenues. We expect CapEx to average 4% to 5% of revenues for the foreseeable future. We closed the quarter with approximately $1,400,000,000 of liquidity comprised of cash and cash equivalents of $714,000,000 and our undrawn revolving credit facility of $675,000,000 We exited the quarter with gross debt of $4,600,000,000 and net leverage ratio of 4.3 times based on our trailing twelve month adjusted EBITDA of $914,000,000 We continue to prioritize deleveraging our balance sheet which remains our top priority after investing in our business, As John mentioned, in 2024, we made a total of $426,000,000 of voluntary prepayments on our term loan.

In January 2025, we repriced our term loan reducing credit spreads by an additional 25 basis points made another $100,000,000 of voluntary principal prepayment. Based on the current interest rates, the combined effect of these recent actions will reduce our annual interest expense run rate by approximately 15,000,000 As the demand environment improves alongside our continued focus on prudently managing working capital and gross margins, we expect to see stronger flow through to the bottom line and higher cash flows allowing us to continue to make good progress on deleveraging. Finally, during the fourth quarter, we paid a dividend of $0.22 per share or $15,000,000 Moving to full year 2024 results, revenue was $3,600,000,000 down 1% year over year. Semiconductor revenue totaled 1,500,000,000.0 one percent year over year and up 2% excluding the impact of foreign exchange. We experienced growth in world class optics and continued stability in DRAM and logic foundry applications while NAND remained at low levels. Electronics and Packaging revenue was $922,000,000 in 2024 up 1% year over year excluding the impact of FX in palladium, sales were up 7%, driven by strength in chemistry. Total chemistry sales increased 12% year over year excluding the impact of foreign exchange and palladium pass through, Specialty industrial revenue was $1,200,000,000 down 5% year over year primarily driven by softness in the industrial market.

Excluding the impact of foreign exchange and palladium pass through, sales declined 3% year over year. Full year gross margin was 47.6% up 190 basis points year over year driven by product mix as well as operating efficiencies. In addition to successfully capturing value through our truly differentiated product portfolio, have also taken measures to manage our material and labor cost [indiscernible] Full year operating margin of 21.3% was up 180 basis points year over year primarily as a result of higher gross margin coupled with disciplined operating expense management. Turning to cash flow, we generated operating cash flow of $528,000,000 an improvement of $2.00 $9,000,000 year over year. Full year free cash flow was $410,000,000 increase of $178,000,000 year over year. Free cash flow conversion of 11.4% improved 500 basis over the prior year. We are pleased with our execution of on the margins and the strength in the underlying cash generation in our business, despite the challenging demand environment in our end markets. Let me now turn to first quarter outlook. We expect revenue of $910,000,000 plus or minus 40,000,000 consistent with the guidance we provided last quarter, and consistent with our view that the market is relatively stable albeit at a slightly higher run rate than what we saw a year ago.

Buy end market our first quarter outlook is as follows: revenue from our semiconductor market is expected to be $400,000,000 plus or minus $15,000,000 revenue from our electronics and packaging market is expected to be $245,000,000 plus or minus $10,000,000 and revenue from our specialty industrial market is expected to be $265,000,000 plus or minus $15,000,000 Based on anticipated revenue levels, and product mix, including lower chemistry sales in the light of the Lunar New Year we estimate first quarter gross margins of 46.5% plus or minus 100 basis points, We expect first quarter operating expenses of €255,000,000 dollars we expect our OpEx spending to remain at this range of $250,000,000 to $260,000,000 a quarter as we continue to invest in people and infrastructure. We estimate adjusted EBITDA of $217,000,000 plus or minus $23,000,000 We expect tax rate of approximately 22% in the first quarter For the year, we expect our tax rate to be in the range of 19% to 21%. Based on these assumptions, we expect first quarter net earnings per diluted share of $1.4 plus or minus $0.27 Our execution has remained strong despite the cyclical challenges in our end markets. We are confident that we are uniquely positioned to capitalize on the With that, I will turn the call back over to John for concluding remarks.

Thank you, Ron. I'll wrap up by saying I'm very pleased with the performance we delivered in 2024. Have leveraged our broad and deep product portfolio to capture opportunities across our businesses in a tough demand environment and that's thanks to the deep engagement we enjoy with our customers. We've managed our costs well maintained strong margins made progress on our deleveraging agenda. Going forward, we're well positioned on multiple fronts. Improvement in NAND when it comes, continued order and design win traction in our world class optics portfolio, and incremental design win and order activity in both chemistry chemistry equipment, which are benefiting from increasing complexity for advanced packaging in the AI era. You also heard from Ram that we will invest incrementally both in growth and business continuity to ensure we're ready to capture exciting opportunities when markets return to growth. Of course, we'll do that while maintaining the prudent focus on profit and cash generation that investors know us for. With that operator, please open the call for Q and A. And our first question for today comes from the line of Chris Sanker from TD Cowen.

Your question please.

Johnny mentioned how some of your NAND component inventory at your semi cap customers is being burnt. Kind of curious where do you think those levels are today versus before And how much ahead would they start purchasing your components again, when they anticipate a land upturn?

Good morning, Krish. Yes, it's a great question. So we have seen green shoots there. We've talked in the past about A lot of our inventory being burned off We're starting to see some of that happen and we're starting to see some new orders for that. So it's already happening. So we're happy with that progress. It's just that it's still off of a low level. So good progress, green shoots. But certainly not at the level where it used to be.

So is it fair to assume just given what your customers what you're seeing SendGrid revenue should remain around these levels in June?

Well, we're not guiding out beyond that as you know, but I would say this, because we're starting to see these orders coming in for NAND, It will depend on how much upgrade business occurs or whether there's a new greenfield. Only those happen, they would drive that part of our revenue up. And so we're in a good position if and when that happens.

And then just a quick follow-up for Ram. You kind of mentioned $250,000,000 to $260,000,000 in OpEx. Is that the run rate used for the rest of the year? I mean, and should it normalize because it seems like it's stepping up quite a bit from last year? Yes. Hi, good morning, Chris.

So first of all, let me just say that we are very disciplined and focused on our OpEx spending. Our OpEx in 2024 was flat to slightly less compared to the previous year. In 2025, we see some opportunities to invest in long term growth, and to build some efficiencies within our within our business. And that's why we are having the additional step up investment. Over the long term, remain committed to a 40% incremental operating margins which we'll see as the top line picks up. Got it. Thanks, Krish.

Thank you. And our next question comes from the line of Peter Pang from JPMorgan. Your question please.

Hey guys, thanks for taking my question.

Just on your semiconductor segment, some of your customers and peers are talking about a mid single digit growth for WFE. So I guess that backdrop just given some of the end market dynamics and some of your design wins, how are you thinking about your relative performance versus that level for the year? Yes.

Good morning, Peter.

Well, we've been able to outperform WFE over the long term by 200 basis points through cycles. So we're really well positioned the design wins activities that we've seen are really helpful. Our focus on world class optics is another lever for us to gain share relatively. You're right, most of our peers and customers have said kind of mid single digit growth in WFE. And if that happens, we certainly will be enjoying that that level of growth as well. You know, during a strong upturn, we outperformed because our customers are pulling a lot more And then downturn, we underperform And overall, as we look through the cycle, and that's where we are still at that 200 basis points above the long term CAGR.

Got it. Okay. And then then on your specialty industrial, that business looks like it's kind of been steady declining over the last few quarters. Any idea of when you think that business would kind of bottom and start to recover?

Yes. And as we said on the call, Peter, it's made up of several different kinds of markets. And so we called out that general industrial is the the area that is seeing weakness, which is not a surprise. I think if you read all the PMI data, that wouldn't be a surprise. And even organically though, it's only down 3% year over year for the entire that segment of our market. So it's bouncing along the bottom. And I think our best visibility is the guidance we gave.

And it can be lumpy because it's made up of several different markets. So I think steady and slightly down is how we see it right now.

Thank you. Thank you, Peter.

Thank you. And our next question comes from the line of Melissa Weathers from Deutsche Bank. Your question please. Hi there. Thank you for letting me ask your question.

I wanted to go back to the NAND side. Can you talk about when we're seeing the spending happen in upgrades versus greenfield capacity? Where does MKS fit in that narrative? Do you have higher content in greenfield versus upgrades or how do you think about upgrade dynamics this year?

Good morning, Melissa. Yes, so certainly a greenfield requires brand new tools. And as you know, MKS has a broad portfolio around those tools. With upgrades, most of the benefit for us is in the power. The RF power. And as I've said before, it depends on what the upgrade is and if it's going from 100 layers to 200 layers, there's certainly a lot of RF power that is needed. And so that's where we're starting to see some of the inventory burn off as we talked about and some of that pulls on certain particular product lines there.

Got it. Thank you. And then still on the semi side, but on the logic piece, this year, we're expecting some pretty healthy spending on the leading edge nodes. Gate all around volumes are going to ramp throughout the year. So can you talk about what the impact of that trend is on MKS' business? Is there do you have any kind of content story with gate all around nodes? Or how should we think about that logic piece continuing to ramp through this year?

Yes, there are lots of things that we play in and contribute to enabling this advanced logic capability. One thing we called out in the earnings call is advanced ozone applications for gate all around. And so so we have a broad portfolio. So we are playing in that advanced node growth, but we have particular areas of product lines that enable that that particular growth as well.

Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you. And our next question comes from the line of Jim Ricchiuti from Needham and Company. Your question please. Hi, good morning. Hey, John.

Besides NAND, which other areas, markets or subsectors are you seeing some signs of recovery, green shoots as you pointed out?

Yes.

Good morning, Jim.

Well, we are starting to see some of that chemistry recover in advanced pack even though quarter on quarter can be lumpy. Did see year over year an increase in the PCB chemistry world and we grew 12% organically believe that is far outpaces the industry by the way.

And the other green shoots that I would call out besides NAND as you say is the equipment chemistry equipment for advanced packaging We saw these orders pick up a couple of quarters ago to continue. To pick up and this is for MLB and HDI applications for AI.

Got it.

Hey, John, looking at that that E and P [indiscernible] Can you help us maybe remind us again how much of that you would characterize as a advanced packaging whether you want to give it to us for the quarter and just some sense as to how that might have grown? Or the year?

Yes. I think what we used to talk about for advanced packaging was really the IC substrate part, the one that's is really enabling for things like AI servers and non AI servers and PCs that's about a third of the PCB market. What's surprising and good for us is that because of the number of layers and the complexity of the number of chips being packaged. We're starting to see AI drive growth in MLB and HDI. And so MLB is a third of the market, HDI is a third of the market and IC substrates are a third of the market. And the equipment that we talked about is driven the equipment orders is driven mostly by HDI and MLB. Packaged substrates, remains the part for the AI servers is great. Those customers are are really ramping. But as we've talked about, that's still 10%, 15% of the entire IC substrate market. And so the other 85% of the market is still relatively muted because that's driven by PCs and non AI servers.

Got it. Thanks, Jim.

Thank you. And our next question comes from the line of Vivek Arya from Bank of America Securities. Your question please.

Hi, this is Michael Manni on for Zacharia. Thanks so much for taking our questions.

To start maybe on gross margins, it seems like they're dipping into this quarter. I think that's related to higher [indiscernible] are the puts and takes for gross margins as we go through the year? Should we expect the greater contribution from chemistry to help any other segment dynamics there Appreciate any color. Thank you.

Hi, Michael. I'll take that. First of all, we're very, very happy with the improvements we've seen in gross margin year over year. We improved our gross margins by 90 basis points, 23 to 24.

And a lot of that was due to the commercial actions and operational excellence programs in place. Most of those operational excellence programs will continue, which includes manufacturing excellence and procurement savings. And will continue to help our gross margin in the coming quarters. What we are seeing in Q1 is higher concentration of equipment that we saw in Q4. That is going to continue and that will impact our mix That combined with the impact of the Lunar New Year reducing our chemistry mix This is the reason why we are guiding our gross margin slightly lower in Q1.

So to your question, The actions that we control to influence the gross margin will continue. And the mix is seasonal. [indiscernible] it is seasonal, the chemistry revenue for packaging. Because we do have a consumer products component to our business. And Lunar New Year, where many of our doesn't occur.

Going forward. And so we kind of expect if normal cyclicality happens that the proportion of our revenue that's chemistry returns.

And so that's a tailwind for gross margin.

Great. Thank you. And then for my follow-up, I just wanted to ask about the your design win pipeline. So with Aditec, Luxra Scientific, and all, how does your design win pipeline look based off the synergies you're able to generate from a customer revenue basis from these acquisitions, has it grown? When do you expect most of these revenues to kind of convert? Is that something we could see later this year is more further out in 2026, 2027. And then finally on that, were there any other were there any areas within that pipeline where maybe the company was surprised at how competitive it was, like areas that maybe it didn't expect to to land a win, but it was more competitive than initially anticipated? Thank you.

Yes. No, we still have great engagement with many customers on this portfolio that we are able to provide meaning laser systems as well as the chemistry and chemistry systems.

So that engagement and the design wins that come from that remain strong. We have multiple design wins that we've talked about in the past. To your point, it does take one or two or three years depending on the customer. For that revenue to show up.

Your other question about were there any headwinds and whatnot, I think most of the headwinds would be you win a design and then maybe that customer is not levered to AI.

And they may not grow as MKS. Maybe they're levered to PCs. And so they would certainly not be adding volume. But once you win that design win and once that mark returns expect them to be successful as well.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you. And our next question comes from the line of Steve Barger from KeyBanc Capital Markets. Your question please.

Thanks. John, for your comment about a healthy pace of design wins for optical assemblies, Are those coming from a product refresh or are those new programs that you haven't been on before?

Yes, both, Steve. Some are program we're already on, but it's an upgrade, the next generation of it. And some are literally new things that no one's ever done. Including our customers. So it's exciting to do both.

Number one, you're not losing share. You're actually being asked to upgrade what you already delivered. Number two, we're being asked to do things more and more complex, require more and more of our portfolio and therefore much stickier and fewer and fewer our competitors can actually do that. So it's a combination of both, Steve. Are you seeing the pace of RFQs or the conversion rates [indiscernible] that initial process to wins change as the cycle starts to move forward? Or how would you characterize that process? Well, I think for world class optics, those design the timing for designs is multiple years. Before they go into the market. So really no change because that pace has to continue no matter where you are in the cycle. I would say we are seeing more of it on average over time because of the investments we made in capability in world class optics. So really long design cycles, difficult things to do, and they continue through cycle.

Got it.

And then as you look at the progression of Advanced Pack I guess, is there an optical demand trend beyond just broader packaging proliferation?

Well, packaging, to your point, is evolving quickly and it's a very dynamic area, which we love, right? Because that means new technology, new opportunities. I think to your point, Coas, S is moving to L to R and all that. And that's important, but really what we're talking about MKS are the 50 layers below that. And the chemistry and the drilling and equipment below that. And so that 50 layers used to be 40 and before that was 30. So that's an exciting area for us and that's really why we thought putting Aditiq together with MKS, Mace a lot of sense, enabling that roadmap to go faster.

Understood. Thanks. Thanks, Steve. [indiscernible] Our next question comes from the line of Toshiya Hari from Goldman Sachs. Your question please.

Good morning. Thank you so much for taking the question.

John, a couple of your customers have spoken to the recent restrictions and how that's having an impact on revenue in calendar twenty five? I know most of this should be indirect for you guys, but I'm curious there's a way to quantify any negative hit from [indiscernible] [indiscernible] Yes, I can start. So our guidance reflects our best view this point. We don't see any material impact based on what's in place today. Now as you know, the situation is quite fluid and we are evaluating it closely.

That came out in the end of the year.

Or are you asking about tariffs?

At the end of the year, the BIS restrictions.

Yes. Well, yes, as you read KLA, Lam, everybody's come up with some new numbers. And we are, as Ram said, because of what we see from our customers. Obviously, if their revenue goes down, we will see that But I would say our direct sales to China for the semiconductor market is very, very low. The numbers that impacted us were occurred in October 2022 and those numbers are out of our revenue is out of our numbers right now. So it's still in direct impact on the same order as what it impacts our customers. Got it. That's helpful. And then as my follow-up, maybe one for Ram.

So you've been with the company for a couple of months now. I'm curious I know you guys are very focused on paying down debt on the balance sheet, but curious if you've been able to identify any the operations of the company, how you guys think about working capital, tax strategy, anything that you've been able to kind of identify and potentially improve going forward? If you can share that with us, that would be really helpful.

Yes, certainly. On cash flow itself, where you are going in a John mentioned in his script, dollars $410,000,000 increase from 178,000,000 year over year. Strong free cash flow generation and a good link to the P and L 11.4% of our revenue was 500 basis points improvement year over year. So on debt repayment, our continued focus will be start from the P and L maintain and continue the actions we are working on now to to keep the margin growth and profitability going. Free cash flow is about 92% of our non GAAP net earnings. So that bridge is very good. And we need to see that translate into the cash flow. We continue to look at repricing and prepayment of our debt as you saw in January. Those opportunities will continue. [indiscernible] in terms of P and L, I think the company is executing well. We We are constantly looking at operational excellence programs, which we will continue to do. And then drive that cash flow to help with the debt repayment. In our capital allocation strategy, has not changed.

Prepayment of debt is our number one priority after we invest in the business.

Thank you very much.

Thank you. And our next question comes from the line of Shane Britt from Morgan Stanley. Your question please.

Thank you for taking my question. So your balance sheet inventory was down twenty days quarter over quarter. Is there anything worth noting here? And how should we think about targets on days of inventory going forward? Reason why I'm asking is that with what seems like within lead time orders increasing or semi, just trying to understand how much longer can you support semi continue to come higher than your expectations? Thank you.

Yes. So we're happy with the progress we made on inventory, Shane. And think as it starts burning down, we're getting to leaner normalized turns rates.

And as you know, if there's a large ramp, obviously, we would use some working capital to prepare ahead of time for that. That's normal. But I think we have a little higher inventory components that we have elected to keep given what happened at the last ramp with shortages. So inventory is a little higher but we're happy with the progress we made in decreasing it.

Does that answer your questions?

Yes.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

And our next question then comes from the line of Vijay Rakesh from Mizuho. Your question please.

Yes. Hey, John and Ram. Just on the AI side, you mentioned the tailwind in packaging. Can you talk to like what person that AI mix as opposed to the total revenues and how do you see that I would say, growing in 2025?

I know you mentioned as a person by the substrate market is pretty small. But if you if you work through like just for you what the exposure is?

Yeah, Vijay. Yeah. So it's a little it's easy to say in certain submarkets like the IC substrate part, which we talked about being kind of 10%, 15% is driven by AI. It's harder to break that out with respect to MLB and HDI. We see the two orders because those are big markets that are levered to other device types. I would say also remember that AI is driven by semiconductors. A lot of semiconductors. And we have over 85% of every step in the process of making semiconductor chips. So if you you do understand certainly that AI is driven by Moore's Law.

Moore's Law is driven by semiconductor progress. And packaging progress.

Addressed 85% of semiconductor processes, 70% of package processes. So as a company, we're levered to AI as much as we always have as we MKS as we always happen to Moore's Law.

So that's our best answer for you, otherwise breaking it up is pretty difficult for us to do. Got it. And then, Ram, as you look at in a better free cash flow and driving faster, better prepayments, Any thoughts on the deleveraging from the ForEx down to the 2x your longer term target. Are you any timing on that? Are you pulling it in Are you looking at that?

Thanks.

Yes. Hi, Nathan. Let's just go back to last year just to drive the point home that our focus we are very focused on what you're asking. In a year when we did not get much help from sales, we repaid close to $976,000,000 including the $50,000,000 mandatory. That alone has brought our number down to 4.3 times.

And all expectations are that with a little help from top line, we can accelerate that given our current cost structure. So the plan and the focus is exactly what you said. To get that down to acceptable levels, which we have said two times net That's our focus. As for timing, I don't want to predict that now, but rest assured our focus is to get it down to that level. Thanks. Thanks Vijay. [indiscernible] Our next question comes from the line of Joe Quadrukiet from Wells Fargo. Your question please.

Yes. Thanks for taking the questions. I think in the past, like during the December call, you talked about like the growth that are in your optics business within the semis business. So I was curious how that did in 2024 and how do you think about the opportunity for growth in 2025 given the outlook for some of those customers?

Yes, Joe. Good morning.

It's John.

We've talked about optics world class optics and we talked about that revenue over a longer time period as you know.

Going from kind of the $150,000,000 to the $300,000,000 level, run rates.

So over the last year or two, we've actually outgrown that [indiscernible] [indiscernible] '24 was a good year, strong year.

Certainly, we're not immune to any cycles in that sub segment of WFE. As we talked about earlier, it's really the design wins that really give us confidence that we will continue this effort and it will lead us to outperform certainly in that subsegment and WFE overall.

Thanks. And then just as a follow-up, maybe a little bit more housekeeping, but I think you're guiding interest expense to be up slightly quarter over quarter. I know it's a net number, but I would have thought I guess that would be given the repricing and prepayment in January MKS.

Yes. The main reason is because of there was two things. We clarified the pension reclass impact in Q4, right, as you guys said. So if you take that out, we are our interest in Q4 is $48,000,000 which is very close to what we guided. The full impact of the $100,000,000 prepayment and the 25 basis points of reduction that we got in January has not included in our Q1 guidance. Our Q1 guidance is 49.5 which is if you look at quarter over quarter, we have dropped our interest rates by 40% compared to Q1 'twenty four versus Q1 'twenty five.

So that's a good model for you to look at what what we have done today, the impact of what we have done today. And we will continue to look for additional opportunities to bring our interest rate down and also to accelerate our prepayments.

Okay. Thank you. Thanks, Joe.

Thank you. This does conclude the question and answer session of today's program. I'd like to hand the program back to Peritash, Mr. For any further remarks.

Thank you all for joining us today and for your interest in MPS. Operator, you may close the call, please.

Certainly. Thank you, ladies and gentlemen, for your participation in today's conference. This does conclude the program. You may now disconnect. Good day.