Sentiment Analysis of the earnings transcript to help figure out if there are any bullish or bearish sentiments that could be gathered from it. We're doing ML and AI based analysis on the earnings call to get some more insights.
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| We'll have a QLC client SSD coming out, which I think people are going to be very impressed with the performance of that |
| And I'm very, very optimistic about the future of the HDD business |
| It all makes me so much better when there's a positive EPS associated with all that |
| If you go back to last quarter, we are very happy with the way the business performed |
| I think if you look at each business on the NAND business, what we've been trying to do is really put together a best-in-class cost position on our fundamental NAND road map |
| So you have that best-in-class core technology position |
| And so he's just very, very well positioned to take that business forward |
| I think through the downturn, we've delivered best-in-class gross margin in our NAND business by a significant amount, quite frankly |
| I think they're really premium assets in we're going to -- Joe Moore Be one in profitability and growth is better than it will richer like that's how it looks |
| You can see over the last few quarters; we continue to improve our cash conversion cycles |
| And so on a like-for-like basis, we think we have a cost advantage with the road map we have, which is a nice bonus to the technology strategy we've taken |
| So we came into the quarter with a lot of strength and a lot of momentum in the business |
| I think from when we guided, the business is stronger than that at this point |
| But each business is performing better from a profitability point of view |
| I mean one of the things I'm excited about leading a NAND business, it's a great business |
| I'm very excited about the business, quite frankly |
| So we feel good about that business in a return to kind of reversion to the mean of the 20%, 20% to 25% through cycle exabyte growth we're getting back to that |
| You got to have the best fundamental technology like it's -- like the wafer coming out of the fab has got to be at the best cost point and the best product out there |
| But we're seeing better volume and better pricing in the drive business |
| And then on the other side of that, we have a very unique portfolio with a lot of optionality and a big part of the business, which the consumer business, which provides through cycle, let's say, call it, resilience -- it's better profitability, less volatility, and we have the ability to build brands in that like in any consumer business that continue to accentuate that attribute |
| And when you look at that way, we believe we're the best -- we're best-in-class NAND business |
| I think that they have -- both have tremendous futures |
| We're very, very confident with the choices we've made |
| What I can tell you is both businesses from a cost structure perspective are in great shape and ready to be independent companies |
| And as the business continues to recover, we expect to continue to improve our balance sheet going forward |
| We saw good growth in China |
| What we're trying to do is dampen volatility and deliver better through-cycle profitability |
| Like that consumer business is a real gem of the portfolio because the brands are very strong |
| But then you've got to marry that to a really, really strong portfolio where you have the most optionality possible to mix into where you're going to get the highest return because NAND is like a bunch of different markets that all require different amounts of investment |
| David Goeckeler The hard drive business is driven by both better pricing and higher shipments |
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| So we've seen -- the profitability of the business has been significantly impaired |
| But I think the drive business has been persistently oversupplied for what, maybe 15 years, 20 years |
| And that's the way the business has been run for a very long time because of this persistent oversupply |
| If you look at what's going on now in the business, this quarter, bits will be down sequentially |
| And because it's such a complicated supply chain with so many parts, and it's been bad for so long, frankly, that I would think some of your subcomponent suppliers have limited flexibility as well |
| And I talked about earlier, we've now the downturn was a brutal downturn it had impact on quite frankly, a lot of people's families that work in those places that we are underemployed |
| David Goeckeler I think that this downturn, I think, showed a lot of things about the NAND market that people believe going into it were not quite true, right? And so a lot about -- if you weren't in the enterprise SSD market, you couldn't have a great NAND business, turned out that's the worst part of the market |
| And we had this huge demand-driven downturn instead of supply-driven |
| That's a big issue, I think, in the NAND business, it's underappreciated |
| But we're also -- I want to balance it with one thing, we're going to see more variable comp headwinds in outperformance of the business in Q4 |
| We've been below that for quite some time |
| We're significantly below that |
| These are both great franchises, and it's very difficult to be forced to be in a position where you're going to pick 1 of them because I think that they're both tremendous assets |
| I don't think it's as much as the squeeze out of other spend because storage is important in the cloud, right? And I think that there has just been so much over-procurement in the drive industry that there was a lot of inventory to work through, especially at some -- some of the big cloud vendors |
| The last cycle, it was below that, both the last peak and the last trough |
| And I think if you look at the wafer equipment spending in NAND, it's been low for quite some time |
| And the answer is always the same, but like can you just talk to that concern that people have |
| Are you -- as the business improves on the NAND side, do you start thinking about investing more in the business? Or are you waiting for certain profitability targets? Wissam Jabre So for this year, we're still looking at a significant decline relative to last year |
| You took down utilization, others did as well, people are in various stages of acknowledging that they're going back to full utilization |
| There's very little supply growth coming from that |
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