Display inspection equipment maker K-Mac saw its order backlog increase 78% in the first half of 2020.
This will help it improve earnings in the second half of 2020.
According to the company’s filings to local financial authorities on Wednesday, K-Mac had 81.7 billion won of order-on-hand as of the first half of 2020.
This is level with that of the 85.7 billion won it had on the same time period in 2018, the year it posted record profits.
It had order-on-hand of 46 billion won in the first half of 2020.
K-Mac’s main offering is ellipsometer used to measure the thickness of thin film transistors and organic materials on OLED lines.
The company has patents in the equipment that were filed since 2007 in the US and South Korea.
The patents are co-owned by K-Mac and Korea Research Institute of Standards and Science.
The company has a worldwide market share of around 80% to 90% in ellipsometer, people familiar with the matter said.
It supplies them to Samsung Display, LG Display, BOE, Tianma and CSOT.
The equipment accounts for over half of the company’s sales.
The company is expected to wrap up contracts worth 12.7 billion won with HKC, 20.1 billion won with Visionox, 13.4 billion won with CSOT and 15.6 billion won with Samsung Display by the second half of 2020.
The equipment for Samsung Display is used for the company’s Q1 line, which will make quantum dot OLEDs.
Contracts with BOE, worth 4 billion won, and HKC, worth 14.3 billion won, will expire in the first half of 2021.
K-Mac posted operating loss of 5 billion won and sales of 30.1 billion won in the first half of 2020 __ a slight downturn compared to 4.2 billion won in operating loss and 31.1 billion won in sales from a year prior.
Meanwhile, the company posted 106.8 billion won in sales and operating profits of 8 billion won in 2018, its highest ever.
This was thanks to expanded investment in OLEDs.
The company is betting on expanded investment into OLEDs in China. K-Mac currently relies on Chinese companies for 80% of its sales. Display inspection equipment accounts for 80% of its sales.
The Daejeon-based company was founded in 1996 and listed on KOSDAQ in 2011. The company was acquired by HB Corporation, the largest shareholder of display inspection company HB Technology, in 2015.
