benefited from the demand for smartphones, security and automotive lenses, and the increase in the use of forehead temperature and image sensing body temperature sensing systems, the situation of shortage of CIS (CMOS image sensor, CMOS Image Sensor) components in recent stage has not changed.
Under this background, companies related to the industrial chain are also constantly being popular in the A-share market. Among them, as of February 21, the Weier Co., Ltd. (603501), which mainly engages in the research and development of CMOS image sensors, rose by 106.21% in more than four months; while the Jingfang Technology (603005), which focuses on packaging and testing in the sensor field, rose by 543.45% during the same period.
According to the Securities Times ·e company reporter, as the stock prices of related companies are rising, shareholders and insiders are reducing their holdings and hot money are playing high-level games one after another; at the same time, some seller institutions have raised the target prices of related companies three times within 22 days.
Oligarchical Competition Pattern
CIS is the full name of CMOS image sensor (CMOS Image Sensor). Among them, CMOS is the abbreviation of Complementary Metal-Oxide-Semiconductor (complementary metal oxide semiconductor), which refers to a technology used to manufacture large-scale integrated circuit chips or chips made using this technology.
With the advantages of low cost, simple design, small size, low power consumption, and high integration, the CMOS manufacturing process is applied to the photosensitive elements of digital imaging equipment, thus resulting in CIS, which is usually composed of image-sensitive unit array, row driver, column driver, timing control logic, AD converter, data bus output interface, control interface and other parts. These parts are usually integrated on the same silicon wafer. Among the value of each link of the camera module, CIS chips account for as high as 52%, and are widely used in camera technology fields such as mobile phones, medical care, automobiles, and security.
In terms of market share, the CIS market is an oligopolistic competitive landscape. Yole Development data shows that in 2017, Japan's Sony , South Korea's Samsung , and the United States' top three CMOS image sensor suppliers had market shares of 42%, 20%, and 11%, respectively, with a total market share of 73%. Among them, , Sony, and Samsung and other self-owned production lines, and Howie adopts the Fab less model (focusing on chip design, manufacturing and other links adopt foundry). In a report in mid-year last year,
Yole believes that the main driving force of CIS's market is still from smartphones (mobile shipments account for 64% of them), followed by demand in the fields of automobiles, security, etc. Although smartphone shipments have stabilized annually, each phone now needs an average of 2.5 image sensors. In addition to the conventional front and rear cameras of mobile phones, rear multi-camera has also become a significant trend. Data released by the agency shows that the market size of CMOS image sensors was about US$15.4 billion in 2018, while this figure is expected to reach US$17 billion in 2019, an increase of 10% year-on-year. It is expected that the market will gradually become saturated in 2024, with the market size reaching US$24 billion.
Production capacity is tight, and industrial chain companies have successively expanded production
As the CIS industry continues to flourish, Sony has also recently increased its full-year performance in 2019 (reporting period is April 2019-March 2020), among which the revenue of the image sensor department has increased from the original estimated 890 billion yen (about 56.5 billion yuan) to 940 billion yen (about 59.7 billion yuan), mainly due to the increase in CIS sales, the demand for image sensors continued to be strong from January to March 2020. Sony said that CIS's production increase plan is underway as expected and the equipment is currently in full capacity.
Previously, there was news that Samsung may move some of its original DRAM production lines this year and put it into production of CMOS image sensors (CIS). It is estimated that CIS will expand production by nearly 20%. After the expansion, Samsung's CIS-related monthly production capacity will increase from 55,000 to 65,000, an increase of nearly 20%. In addition, companies such as Howie are also increasing their production expansion.
According to a reporter from Securities Times e Company, the United States' Howie (the parent company is Beijing Howie) is currently a subsidiary of Weier Co., Ltd. (603501), and is undergoing the construction of wafer testing and wafer reconstruction production line project (Phase II).In 2019, Weier Co., Ltd. completed the merger and reorganization of three CIS companies, namely Beijing Howie (85.53% equity), Spike (42.27% equity), and Sixinyuan (79.93% equity), and its main business scope extends to the research and development and sales of CMOS image sensors. The performance forecast on the evening of January 21 showed that the above acquisition further improved the company's profitability. Weier Co., Ltd. expects that the net profit in 2019 will increase by 261 million yuan to 361 million yuan year-on-year, a year-on-year increase of 188% to 260%.
CIS market prosperity has also brought about improvement in production capacity and performance profits to related CIS packaging and testing plants. It is reported that the production capacity of Tongxindian, a CIS packaging and testing plant in Taiwan, has been fully loaded in the first quarter and has recently raised prices to customers, but Tongxindian has not responded to the market price increase. However, the relevant person in charge of the company is optimistic about the market prospects this year and believes that driven by strong demand, CIS will be the product with the strongest growth momentum in Tongxindian.
Jingfang Technology (603005) also focuses on the packaging and testing business in the sensor field, and has the ability to mass-produce and mass-produce packaging technology for 8-inch and 12-inch wafer-level chip size packaging technology. The products are widely used in many fields such as consumer electronics, security monitoring, identity identification, and automotive electronics. On January 22, the company expected its net profit in 2019 to be approximately RMB 102 million to RMB 109 million, a year-on-year increase of 43.41% to 53.25%. "During the Spring Festival, the company's production line did not take off, and it has been continuously produced normally and has not been affected. The production is currently normal and full." The company recently revealed to the outside world.
is currently in saturation of production and can no longer meet the market demand. At the end of last year, Jingfang Technology planned to raise 1.4 billion yuan for the integrated circuit 12-inch TSV and heterogeneous integrated intelligent sensor module project. After the project is completed, it will form a production capacity of 180,000 pieces per year, with a construction period of one year, and the total annual profit is expected to be 160 million yuan.
Shareholders reduced their holdings and institutions adjusted their target prices
From the perspective of the capital market, the relevant companies have been rising sharply in recent stages. Among them, in about four months since October 18 last year, the share price of Jingfang Technology started at 20 yuan. As of February 21 this year, the closing price was 128.69 yuan, an increase of 543.45%. Vel shares also performed well, and the stock price rose from 97 yuan to 200.02 yuan during the period, an increase of about 106.21%. Both companies significantly outperformed the semiconductor and components industry index during the same period, with the latter rising by about 60%.
As the stock price rises, market differences gradually emerge. On February 19, OV-HK, a shareholder of Jingfang Technology, announced that it would reduce its holdings of 2.9379 million shares of the company, which is no more than 1.28% of the company's total share capital. Before this reduction, Jingfang Technology has already reduced its holdings by more than 5% of the shares. The trading seats on February 18 showed that the top five seats participating in the trading transactions within three consecutive trading days were all hot money from the sales department, and no institutions were seen.
Vel Co., Ltd. The announcement of directors and senior management personnel to reduce their holdings on shares on February 20 disclosed that as of February 19, the three shareholders reduced their holdings by 1.8495 million shares, 1 million shares and 670,000 shares respectively, with the reduction amounts of 224 million yuan, 111 million yuan and 104 million yuan respectively.
Faced with huge short-term gains and shareholders and insiders’ successive reductions in holdings, how do you view the future trends of CIS-related stocks? According to the Securities Times reporter's observation, there are still many institutions that are optimistic. West China Securities has issued three research reports on Weier Co., Ltd. since January 15. While maintaining the profit forecast unchanged (the company's EPS in 2019-2021 is expected to be 0.57 yuan, 2.7 yuan and 3.89 yuan respectively), it has raised the company's target price many times. For example, in the research report on January 15, West China Securities believes that according to the wind data statistics, the relative PE of the leading domestic IC design companies in 2021 is 50-60 times. Considering that the company is in the optical gold track, the CIS economy continues to increase, the company's target price has been raised from 173 yuan to 211.5 yuan; the company's stock price closed at 177.05 yuan on the same day. On January 21, West China Securities slightly raised its target price to 213.25 yuan.
In the research report on February 6, West China Securities still maintained its profit forecast unchanged, and believes that according to Wind statistics, the relative PE of leading domestic IC design companies in 2021 is between 60-65 times, and the company's target price will be increased to 232.6 yuan.
Jingfang Technology A recent research report comes from Pacific Securities . In the performance review report on January 22, the institution believes that in the medium and short term, the high prosperity CIS chip packaging generated by consumption, security, and on-board are the company's performance guarantee; in the long run, the currently promoted biometrics and 3D sensing will be expected to open up new space. It is expected that the company will achieve net profits of RMB 107 million, RMB 427 million and RMB 537 million respectively from 2019 to 2021, with the corresponding EPS of RMB 0.47, RMB 1.86 and RMB 2.34 respectively. At that time, the target price given by the institution was 84 yuan. However, the current share price of Jingfang Technology has been nearly 53.2% higher than the target price.
This article is from e-company's official microsoft
