President's Message

Our basic management policy of this past financial year was to "concentrate our resources on selected business areas where we excel and expect high growth". Under this policy, we worked to transform our corporate structure to the one that is centered around the semiconductor-related business while reinforcing our financial strength. By the end of the financial year, we have achieved most of the intended transformation, with semiconductor photomask inspection systems now being our core business, and succeeded in restoring a corporate structure that is focused on highly profitable operations. In the semiconductor industry, from which the largest portion of our sales comes, we saw steady market growth for logic devices that are widely used in smart phones and tablet PCs and, accordingly, a high level of capital investment was made by foundries and others. The level of investment in further scaling for advanced semiconductor devices was also high. As a result, Lasertec recorded a good number of new orders and sales, thanks mainly to photomask inspection systems. Our sales for this financial year amounted to 12,337 million yen (down 3.0% from the previous financial year) and our net profit was 1,798 million yen (up 18.5%).

Our "New Medium-Term Business Plan" spans a 9 year period from July 2009 to June 2018. It is divided into 3 phases (Phase 0, Phase I, and Phase II), each of which is three years long.

As we started a new financial year in July 2012, we entered the first year of "Phase I - Take on New Challenges". We are now working to achieve two goals: (1) Reinforce our core business, and (2) Create a pillar of new business. In the area of core business, we will make an enhanced effort to develop photomask inspection systems and mask blanks inspection systems of the next generation, and actively engage in sales promotion towards leading companies around the globe. In the area of new business, we will focus our attention on semiconductor wafer applications, for which we will reinforce our marketing function and expedite our new product development. By developing unique inspection systems based on our proprietary technologies and being engaged in worldwide sales promotion, we will take on the challenge of creating a pillar of new business.

All of us at Lasertec are resolved to take full advantage of our core expertise - applied optics - and work harder to ensure timely launches of new products. Our humble wish is to become a company that can contribute more to the progress of society. We appreciate your high expectations for the future of Lasertec and sincerely ask for your continued support.