Axcelis Technologies IncACLS
▲ PositiveCapitalrelevance
Q2 revenue and EPS beat forecasts, and full-year outlook raised.
Impact on stocks 2
Semiconductors▲ · 2 stocks
Axcelis Technologies Inc
Veeco Instruments IncVECO
▲ PositiveCapitalrelevance
Pending merger with Axcelis expected to close in H2 2026, benefiting from Axcelis's improved outlook.
Theme Impact 2
Off-coverage companies
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KLA Lifts Calendar 2026 WFE Market Estimate to Low-$150 Billion Range
KLA Corporation is benefiting from accelerating artificial intelligence infrastructure spending, which is driving higher investments in leading-edge foundry and logic technologies and boosting demand for its process-control solutions. In fiscal 2026, the Semiconductor Process Control segment's revenues increased 12% year over year, and overall fiscal 2026 revenues rose 12% year over year to $13.58 billion. During the fourth quarter of fiscal 2026, management raised its calendar 2026 wafer-fabrication equipment market estimate, including advanced packaging, to the low-$150 billion range, up from its previous $140 billion-plus view and approximately $120 billion in calendar 2025. KLAC expects second-half 2026 revenues to be approximately 20% higher than the first half, aided by high-performance computing, high-bandwidth memory, increasing extreme ultraviolet adoption in DRAM and advanced packaging technologies such as hybrid bonding, and said backlog was expected to reach about $12.5 billion. The company faces intensifying competition from Applied Materials, which expects its process diagnostics and control business to grow more than 50% in calendar 2026, and from ASML, which expects advanced foundry and logic revenues to rise about 25% in 2026 and extreme ultraviolet revenues to increase roughly 45%.
Kingsemi's second-largest shareholder Liaoning Kefa plans inquiry-based transfer of 1% stake; share price up over 145% this year
After market close on September 18, Kingsemi announced that shareholder Liaoning Kefa Industrial Co., Ltd., which holds more than 5% of the company, intends to carry out an inquiry-based transfer of pre-IPO shares totaling 2.021 million shares, representing 1.00% of the company's total share capital, citing its own capital needs. Liaoning Kefa currently holds 21,315,832 shares, or 10.55% of total share capital, making it the company's second-largest shareholder, behind only NAURA Technology Group Co., Ltd. at 17.84%. The transfer is being organized by CITIC Securities Co., Ltd., with a minimum transfer price of no less than 70% of the average stock trading price over the 20 trading days before September 18, 2026. Transferees must be institutional investors and may not transfer the shares within six months of acquisition. Based on a rough estimate using the September 18 closing price of 363.98 yuan per share, the corresponding market value is approximately 736 million yuan. Just over a month earlier, company directors and senior executives Zhang Xinchao, Wang Mingbo, Cheng Hu, and Liu Shujie had announced reduction plans to sell no more than 63,093 shares in total. As of September 18, Kingsemi's share price had risen 145.09% year-to-date. In the first half of 2026, the company achieved operating revenue of 897 million yuan, up 26.47% year-on-year, while net profit attributable to shareholders of the listed company was 8.0622 million yuan, down 49.37% year-on-year.
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Applied Materials Bets $5 Billion on India Semiconductor Buildout
Applied Materials is committing $5 billion over a decade to India's semiconductor push, a bet on research, suppliers and talent that Reuters reported Thursday. The spending plan works out to roughly $500 million a year and targets the infrastructure India still needs to become a serious chip-manufacturing hub. India expects semiconductor consumption to reach $110 billion by 2030, up from roughly $45 billion to $50 billion in 2025, but only three packaging plants are operating and a large-scale fabrication ecosystem has yet to fully emerge. For Applied, the annualized commitment equals only about 1.4% of revenue based on its record $9.12 billion quarterly sales, leaving room to build an early position without letting India dominate capital allocation. The shares traded around $416.40, up roughly 0.3%, and GuruFocus data shows the market price sitting 68.39% above GF Value of $247.28.