마테리온(MTRN) 2026년 3분기 실적발표 컨퍼런스 콜: 사상 최대 매출, EPS 가이던스 상향

핵심 요약

• 마테리온(Materion)은 2026년 3분기 부가가치 매출이 전년 동기 대비 19% 증가한 3억 1,370만 달러로 사상 최고치를 기록했으며, 조정 EPS는 37% 증가해 사상 최고치인 1.93달러를 기록했다고 발표했다.
• 조정 EBITDA는 7,070만 달러로 27% 증가했다. 조정 EBITDA 마진은 150bp 확대된 22.5%를 기록하며 경영진의 중기 목표치인 23%에 근접했다.
• 성장은 전반적으로 이루어졌다. 반도체 매출은 분기 사상 최고치를 기록했고, 항공우주 및 방산 매출은 40% 이상 증가했으며, 통신 및 데이터센터 매출은 전년 동기 대비 70% 이상 늘어났다.
• 전자 재료(Electronic Materials) 부문이 사업부 수익성을 이끌었으며, 부가가치 매출은 1억 340만 달러로 30% 증가했고 조정 EBITDA는 3,320만 달러로 54% 증가했다. 해당 부문의 마진은 500bp 확대된 32.1%를 기록했다.
• 경영진은 연간 조정 EPS 가이던스를 기존 6.80~7.20달러에서 7.10~7.40달러로 상향 조정했으며, 2026년 전체 매출 성장률이 10%대 후반을 기록할 것으로 기대하고 있다.
• 마테리온은 분기 말 기준 수주액과 수주잔고 모두 사상 최고치를 기록했다. 경영진은 2026년 초 이후 수주율이 전년 동기 대비 약 25% 상승했으며, 수주잔고는 약 35% 증가했다고 밝혔다.

주요 재무 데이터

사업 및 영업 실적

전자 재료

전자 재료 부문은 반도체 수요, 신규 사업 수주, 전반적인 시장 모멘텀에 힘입어 전년 동기 대비 30% 증가한 1억 340만 달러의 부가가치 매출을 올렸다. 조정 EBITDA는 54% 증가한 3,320만 달러로 사상 최고치를 기록했으며, 마진은 500bp 상승한 32.1%를 나타냈다.

경영진은 반도체 매출이 6분기 연속 성장했다고 밝혔다. 연초 대비 누적 반도체 성장률은 약 26%로, 경영진이 언급한 웨이퍼 투입량(wafer-start) 예상 성장률인 약 11%를 상회했다. 성장 동력에는 고성능 연산(HPC), 고대역폭 메모리(HBM), 미세 공정 반도체, 데이터 스토리지 및 원자층 증착(ALD) 포트폴리오가 포함됐다.

성능 재료

성능 재료 부문은 전년 동기 대비 14% 증가한 1억 7,870만 달러의 부가가치 매출을 기록했다. 성장은 주로 항공우주 및 방산, 통신 및 데이터센터, 산업 시장 및 신규 사업 수주에 기반했다.

조정 EBITDA는 12% 증가한 4,260만 달러로 부가가치 매출의 23.8%를 차지했다. 물량 증가 및 가격 인상 효과는 비우호적인 제품 믹스로 인해 일부 상쇄되었다. 경영진은 대형 방산 수주와 기타 최종 시장 전반의 수요 가속화에 힘입어 4분기 매출이 의미 있게 증가할 것으로 기대하고 있다.

정밀 광학

정밀 광학 부문의 부가가치 매출은 3,160만 달러로 17% 증가해 2021년 초 이후 가장 높은 분기 실적을 올렸으며, 6분기 연속 매출 개선세를 기록했다.

조정 EBITDA는 72% 증가한 550만 달러를 기록했다. 마진은 물량 증가, 유리한 가격/제품 믹스, 신규 프로그램 수주 및 운영 개선을 반영해 560bp 확대된 17.4%를 나타냈다.

최종 시장 모멘텀

항공우주 및 방산 매출은 방산, 민항기 및 우주 응용 분야 전반의 성장에 힘입어 전년 동기 대비 40% 이상 증가했다. 통신 및 데이터센터 매출은 70% 이상 증가해 2019년 이후 해당 시장에서 가장 강력한 분기 실적을 달성했다.

산업용 매출은 3분기에 8%, 연초 대비 누적 11% 증가했다. 경영진은 회사의 베릴륨-니켈 사업의 지속적인 견조함도 강조했다.

경영진 가이던스

마테리온은 2026년 조정 EPS 전망치를 기존 6.80~7.20달러에서 7.10~7.40달러로 상향 조정했다. 경영진은 중간값 기준으로 새 전망치가 전년 대비 약 33%의 성장을 의미한다고 설명했다. 이는 회사의 2026년 세 번째 가이던스 상향 조정이다.

경영진은 연간 전체 매출 성장률이 10%대 후반을 기록할 것으로 기대하며, 4분기 매출 가속화가 의미 있게 이뤄질 것으로 예상하고 있다. 이러한 전망은 사상 최고 수준의 수주잔고, 지속적인 수주 모멘텀, 신규 사업 기여, 그리고 반도체, 항공우주 및 방산, 통신 및 데이터센터, 산업 및 에너지 응용 분야 전반의 수요에 힘입은 것이다.

회사는 수익성 증가와 운전자본 개선에 힘입어 현금 창출 측면에서 또 한 번의 강력한 분기를 거둘 것으로 예상한다. 경영진은 더 높은 목표를 고려하기 전에 23%의 조정 EBITDA 마진 목표를 지속적으로 달성하는 데 집중하고 있다.

리스크 및 주요 점검 사항

• 가전제품 부문은 이전 4분기 품질 문제와 연결되었던 특정 프레시전 클래드(Precision Clad) 프로젝트 이슈로 인해 마테리온의 최종 시장 중 유일하게 연초 대비 누적 성장이 감소를 기록했다. 경영진은 생산량이 문제 발생 이전 수준으로 회복되었거나 이를 약간 상회했다고 언급했다.
• 경영진은 전분기 대비 반도체 매출의 급격한 증가에 타이밍 요인이 일부 영향을 미쳤다고 언급했으나, 점유율 확대, 신규 사업 수주, 가치 기반 가격 정책도 함께 언급했다.
• 성능 재료 부문의 수익성은 이번 분기 동안 비우호적인 제품 믹스 영향에 직면했다.
• 조정 EBITDA 마진이 22.5%에 달했음에도 경영진은 23% 목표를 지속 가능하게 달성했다고 선언하기에는 아직 이르다고 말했다.

애널리스트 Q&A 주요 내용

수요 가시성: 경영진은 성장이 단일 시장에 의존하지 않는다는 점을 강조했다. 사상 최고 수준의 수주 및 수주잔고는 여러 최종 시장에 분산되어 있으며, 반도체 수요는 데이터센터, 메모리, 로직, 통신 및 스토리지 전반에서 광범위하게 나타나고 있다.

생산능력 투자: 마테리온은 생산성 향상과 함께 목표로 하는 생산능력 증설을 결합할 계획이다. 이전에 발표된 6,500만 달러 규모의 방산 투자는 2027년 말까지 가동될 것으로 예상된다. 회사는 또한 지난 2~3년 동안 고성능 연산 및 탄탈럼 생산능력에도 투자해 왔다.

글로벌 제조 거점: 경영진은 핵심 전문성 센터를 유지하면서 고객사 인근의 현지 제조 시설을 확장할 계획이다. 경영진은 한국과 유럽에 대한 투자를 언급하며 자체 투자와 M&A 모두 추가적인 지역 생산능력을 뒷받침할 수 있다고 설명했다.

R&D 자원: 회사는 보고된 R&D 지출에 외부 자금 지원과 고객, 정부 및 컨소시엄과의 협업이 반영되어 있다고 밝혔다. 또한 마테리온은 개발 생산성과 고객 프로그램을 지원하기 위해 기술 영업 팀, 기술 마케팅 및 AI 관련 도구를 활용하고 있다.

실적발표 컨퍼런스 콜 전문

전체 실적 발표 컨퍼런스 콜 녹취록

경영진 발표

Operator

Greetings. Welcome to the Materion Third Quarter 2026 Earnings Conference Call. [Operator Instructions] Please note that this conference is being recorded. I will now turn the conference over to your host, Kyle Kelleher, Director, Investor Relations and Corporate FP&A. Please go ahead.

Kyle Kelleher

Good morning, and thank you for joining us on our third quarter 2026 earnings conference call. This is Kyle Kelleher, Director, Investor Relations and Corporate FP&A. Before we begin our remarks this morning, I would like to point out that we have posted materials on the company's website that we will reference as part of today's review of the quarterly results. You can also access the materials through the download feature on the earnings call webcast link.

With me today is Jugal Vijayvargiya, President and Chief Executive Officer; and Shelly Chadwick, Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. Our format for today's conference call is as follows: Jugal will provide opening comments on the quarter. Following Jugal, Shelly will review the detailed financial results in addition to discussing expectations for the remainder of 2026. We will then open up the call for questions.

Let me remind investors that any forward-looking statements made in the presentation, including those in the outlook section and during the question-and-answer portion, are based on current expectations. The company's actual performance may materially differ from that contemplated by the forward-looking statements as a result of a variety of factors. Those factors are listed in the earnings press release we issued this morning. Additionally, comments regarding earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, depletion and amortization, net income and earnings per share reflect the adjusted GAAP numbers shown in Attachments 4 through 9 in this morning's press release. The adjustments are made in the prior year period for comparative purposes and remove special items, noncash charges and certain discrete income tax adjustments.

And now I'll turn over the call to Jugal for his comments.

Jugal Vijayvargiya

Thanks, Kyle, and good morning, everyone. I'm pleased to be with you today to discuss our third quarter performance and the outstanding momentum we continue to build across Materion. Q3 was an exceptional quarter and a powerful reflection of the strength of our Advanced Materials portfolio, the attractiveness of our end market exposure and the disciplined execution of our global team. Demand continued to accelerate across many of our key markets, and our business delivered outstanding performance, resulting in record sales, earnings, incoming orders and backlog. These results underscore both the resilience of our business model and our ability to capitalize on favorable market dynamics.

We delivered record value-added sales of approximately $314 million and highest ever adjusted earnings per share of $1.93, marking another milestone quarter for the company. Each business segment achieved double-digit year-over-year growth in both sales and earnings, underscoring the strength of our strategy and execution. Importantly, these results were not driven by any single business, customer or end market. Growth was widespread across the organization, and that breadth gives us considerable confidence in the sustainability of our momentum. Just as importantly, we expanded margins for the fourth consecutive quarter on a year-over-year basis and continue to make meaningful progress toward our midterm adjusted EBITDA margin target of 23%. These results highlight the inherent leverage in our business model and reflect the benefits of our ongoing focus on operational excellence, portfolio optimization, value-based pricing and disciplined execution across the organization. As a result, we are translating strong demand into profitable growth and increasing shareholder value.

The semiconductor market remained a significant source of growth in the quarter, driving the highest quarterly sales in the company's history. Customers continue to invest in next-generation semiconductor technologies, while our strategic growth initiatives generated additional momentum across the business. We delivered our fifth consecutive quarter of year-over-year growth, reinforcing our strong competitive position in the semiconductor value chain. Aerospace and defense was another standout performer during the quarter with sales increasing more than 40% year-over-year. Strength was broad-based across defense, commercial aerospace and space applications, reflecting both favorable market conditions and the value we bring to our customers' most demanding programs. Customer engagement remains robust. Our opportunity pipeline continues to expand, and we are securing positions on an increasing number of mission-critical programs and platforms with strong long-term demand prospects.

These trends reinforce our confidence that aerospace and defense will remain a significant driver of growth for Materion in the years ahead. Another end market demonstrating significant momentum for us is telecom and data center. Sales increased more than 70% year-over-year, delivering our strongest quarterly performance since 2019. Demand continues to be fueled by ongoing investments in data center infrastructure, high-speed connectivity and network expansion to support accelerating global data consumption. We believe these secular trends position us well for continued growth as customers invest to support rapidly expanding data and connectivity needs.

Perhaps most encouraging is the broad-based nature of the demand we are experiencing across our portfolio. Strong contributions from semiconductor, aerospace and defense, telecom and data center, industrial and energy applications demonstrate the strength and diversity of our business. Rather than relying on any single market or growth driver, we are benefiting from multiple end markets that are positioned favorably and supported by long-term secular trends. This reinforces the value of our portfolio strategy and gives us confidence in our ability to generate sustainable growth and create value across varying market conditions. Over the past several years, we have transformed Materion into a more focused, higher-performing advanced materials company aligned with attractive secular growth trends. The performance we are delivering today reflects the success of that transformation.

We are capturing larger opportunities, expanding our presence across multiple growth markets, improving profitability, generating strong cash flow and further strengthening our competitive standing. Most importantly, an increasing share of our business is concentrated in highly differentiated applications where our materials, technologies and technical expertise enable critical customer outcomes and create lasting competitive advantages. This evolution has strengthened the quality of our portfolio and position Materion to deliver sustainable growth.

As strong as our quarterly results were, what excites me most is the momentum we are seeing beneath the surface. We exited the quarter with the highest level of incoming orders and the largest backlog in Materion's history. Year-to-date incoming orders reached a new record and backlog continued to expand meaningfully, providing strong visibility into future demand. More importantly, this strength is broad-based. This momentum is being fueled by expanding customer technology road maps, growing participation in long-duration programs, new business wins and rising demand for the advanced material solutions that enable our customers' most critical applications. Together, these indicators provide confidence that the growth opportunities ahead of us remain sustainable.

Looking ahead, we are entering the fourth quarter with unprecedented momentum. Record backlog, record incoming orders, continued strength across our end markets and strong operating performance provide us with confidence as we move into the final quarter of the year. Our optimism is not based solely on the results we have achieved to date. It is reinforced by what we see on the horizon, expanding customer opportunities, strong demand indicators and direct feedback from customers that points to continued investment in the markets we serve.

Based on the momentum we are seeing across the business, we expect a meaningful acceleration in sales during the fourth quarter, resulting in high teens top line growth for the full year. Reflecting this strength, we are raising our full year adjusted earnings outlook to a range of $7.10 to $7.40 per share. At the midpoint, this represents approximately 33% growth over the prior year and reflects both our strong performance year-to-date and our expectations for continued momentum as we conclude what is shaping up to be a record year for Materion.

I would like to thank our employees around the world for their dedication, innovation and commitment to excellence. Their unwavering focus on safety, quality, operational performance and customer service continues to be the foundation of Materion's success. I also want to thank our customers and shareholders for their continued trust, confidence and partnership. With that, I'll turn the call over to Shelly to review the financial details.

Shelly Chadwick

Thanks, Jugal, and good morning. During my comments, I will reference the slides posted on our website this morning, starting on Slide 10. In the third quarter, value-added sales, which exclude the impact of pass-through precious metal costs, were a record $313.7 million, up 19% from the prior year. Adjusted earnings per share were a record $1.93, up 37% from prior year. As Jugal outlined, the strength in the quarter was seen across the company. I'll focus my comments on how that growth translated into higher earnings, margin expansion and strong cash generation.

Turning to Slide 11. Adjusted EBITDA was $70.7 million or 22.5% of value-added sales, an increase of 27% year-over-year with 150 basis points of margin expansion. This marks our fourth consecutive quarter of year-over-year margin expansion and represents continued progress toward our 23% midterm adjusted EBITDA margin target. The increase in the quarter was driven by higher volume and favorable price/mix, demonstrating strong incremental profitability on the quarter's sales growth.

Moving to Slide 12. Let me review third quarter results by business segment. Starting with Performance Materials, value-added sales were $178.7 million in the quarter, up 14% year-over-year. This increase was driven primarily by market growth and new business wins across aerospace and defense, telecom and data center and industrial. Adjusted EBITDA was $42.6 million or 23.8% of value-added sales, up 12% compared to the prior year period. The year-over-year increase was driven by higher volume and pricing, partially offset by unfavorable mix. Looking out to the fourth quarter, we expect to finish the year strong with a meaningful step-up in sales driven by large incoming defense orders and continued order acceleration across other end markets.

Turning to Slide 13. Electronic Materials delivered another outstanding quarter. Value-added sales were $103.4 million, up 30% year-over-year, led by continued momentum across the semiconductor market. New business wins and accelerating broad-based demand are fueling the strong growth. Adjusted EBITDA was a record $33.2 million or 32.1% of value-added sales, up 54% year-over-year with 500 basis points of margin expansion. This marks the sixth consecutive quarter of year-over-year margin expansion in EM. These results reflect higher volume and favorable price/mix, together with contributions from new business and the benefit of the cost optimization work completed over the past several years.

Looking at the fourth quarter, we expect to see strong top and bottom line results, driven by continued semiconductor outperformance and contributions from new business. On Slide 14, Precision Optics value-added sales were $31.6 million, up 17% year-over-year, driven by strength across most end markets, coupled with new business. This marks the segment's sixth consecutive quarter of top line improvement and the highest quarterly sales since early 2021. Adjusted EBITDA was $5.5 million or 17.4% of VA sales, up 72% year-over-year with 560 basis points of margin expansion. This increase was driven by higher volume and strong price/mix and signifies the fifth consecutive quarter of double-digit year-over-year improvement. new program wins and operational improvements are translating into sustained profitable growth. Looking into the fourth quarter, we expect continued top and bottom line improvement to close out an impressive step forward in the transformation of Precision Optics.

Moving now to cash, debt and liquidity on Slide 15. We ended the quarter with a net debt position of approximately $382 million and $276 million of available capacity on our existing credit facility with leverage at 1.5x, the low end of our targeted range. We generated $46 million of free cash flow in the quarter, bringing year-to-date free cash flow to $85 million with conversion of approximately 120% in the quarter and 88% year-to-date. Looking ahead, we expect to deliver another strong cash performance in the fourth quarter, supported by higher earnings and continued working capital improvements.

Lastly, turning to Slide 16, I'll cover our 2026 outlook. Our performance through the first 9 months has positioned us to deliver a record year. Strong year-to-date results, coupled with record backlog and continued order rate momentum give us increased confidence as we close out the year. We now anticipate high teens top line growth for 2026 and are raising our adjusted EPS outlook to $7.10 to $7.40 compared to our prior guidance range of $6.80 to $7.20. At the midpoint, this represents approximately 33% growth year-over-year. This is our third outlook increase of the year, reflecting broad-based demand, strong operational execution and earnings contribution from new business wins.

Taken together, our record sales and earnings, sustained margin expansion, strong cash generation and strengthening balance sheet leave us well positioned to continue investing in growth while creating long-term value for shareholders. This concludes our prepared remarks. We will now open the line for questions.

Operator

[Operator Instructions] First question comes from Daniel Moore with CJS Securities.

질의응답

Dan Moore

Congrats on obviously strong results and execution. I guess start with the stock has been all over the place following sort of the AI and semiconductor sentiment. And you gave great detail in the prepared remarks, but maybe contrast that with the cadence of how your demand is building for the core precious metals and tantalum targets in the semi side of the business as well as what we're seeing in aerospace and defense and industrial. As you look sort of deeper into the crystal ball, what does the runway look like? And I'll stop there and maybe kind of shift gears to margins, but just trying to compare and contrast what is going on with operations in the marketplace versus the core underlying momentum that is building in the business.

Jugal Vijayvargiya

Yes. Dan, I think with regard to our growth, the one thing that I would highlight to start with is that it is really broad-based. We have growth across all of our end markets. If you look at the year-to-date growth, we are positive and in fact, significantly positive on all the end markets. The only end market that's negative for us is consumer electronics, but that's really a specific project issue with the PMI, which we've discussed a number of times. Other than that, I mean, we have significant positive growth on a year-to-date basis across all of our markets.

Our semiconductor market, as you know, we delivered record results here in the third quarter, but we've had growing results for the last 6 quarters. In aerospace and defense, all 3 segments of our aerospace and defense. So we talk about commercial aerospace, we talk about space and we talk about defense. All 3 continue to grow, and they grew in the third quarter. In our industrial business, PMI index continues to be north of 50. Our year-to-date growth is 11%. In Q3, we grew 8%. Our Berlin nickel business, which is part of the industrial business, continues to be strong and continues to support all the build activities and infrastructure improvements that are happening in the U.S.

Our Telecom and data center business continues to do well, highest quarter of sales since 2019 and so on. So I think what we want to highlight here is that our growth is not based on one particular vertical. It's really based on many, many things that are going on in the marketplace, but then also the new business activities that we have going on in each of our markets. So we're quite excited about where we are. Our order rate, you highlighted it, is about 25% higher since the beginning of the year on a year-over-year basis. Our backlog growing again. And this is sort of a continuing theme that we have given quarter in, quarter out, but our backlog continues to increase. And now we're up to approximately 35% increase on a year-over-year basis for our backlog. And again, that goes across our end markets.

So certainly, the AI side, the data center side is important. The high-performance computing is important. In the semiconductor market, it's also broad-based, whether it's data centers, whether it's memory, whether it's logic, communication, et cetera, it's really a broad-based growth that we have in each of the markets as well as across the company. So we're excited about kind of where things ended up in Q3. We're really excited about where things are positioned for Q4, as you've noted -- as we've noted with our guide change that we have done. And hopefully, these things will then continue as we go on over the next year to more years.

Dan Moore

Maybe just talk to your capacity as you look across the businesses, looking to '27 and beyond, given the strength that you're seeing, are there areas that you may be looking to increase investment or capacity given those strong tailwinds?

Jugal Vijayvargiya

Yes, absolutely. We -- as you know, we've made good investments over the last several years. We've made a lot of organic investments. Our capacity has been an important part of that. Our operational excellence in general has been an important part of that. And we'll continue to do that across the plants where we think we need the capacity. But our teams have done a great job of driving efficiency, driving higher productivity, getting more out from our facilities with the capacity that we have. But like you said, at the same time, we're adding capacity. We announced you'll recall an investment, $65 million investment on the defense side, where we're putting that in. That should be in by the end of next year. So that capacity is going to certainly help us.

We made significant capacity investments over the last 2, 3 years actually in our high-performance computing. So Tantalum business you highlighted. And so that, I think, gives us more opportunities. So we are making capacity improvements and investments. We'll continue to do that. But I think our teams have done a really nice job of driving more output with the capacity -- with the equipment and plants that we have and making the incremental investments on an as-needed basis.

Dan Moore

Last one, I'll jump out. Very nice, I would say, rebound but uptick in adjusted EBITDA margins up to 22.5% already approaching that near-term target. So careful what you wish for. But looking into '27 and beyond, just talk to the sustainability of those margins and how much upside might there be as you look out over the next few years? I know we've got that near-term target. Just talk to the kind of operating leverage from here if we continue to see healthy organic growth as we've seen.

Jugal Vijayvargiya

Yes. Well, you'll recall, Daniel, our midterm target was 20% just a couple of years back. And we wanted to make sure that we could deliver that on a more sustainable basis, get a few quarters under our belt. Once we did that, we were able to go in and say, okay, we're going to raise that to 23%. And now we've been delivering consistently north of 20%, and we are approaching, as you said, 23%. We want to make sure that we can get there and deliver it for a few quarters. And I think as we can do that, then we'll sit back and look at what more could be possible. But right now, I think our focus is on making sure that we are delivering 23% on a consistent quarterly basis. Our teams are fully engaged on that, and we'll continue to drive towards that.

Shelly Chadwick

Yes. Jugal, just to add on a little bit to that. When we set that 23% target, we talked about the fact that we saw the path. We knew what it would take to get there and why we thought 23% was the right number for us to target for. I think our businesses are performing ahead of our expectations, right? So maybe we're getting there a little bit sooner. We're not ready to claim we're here at '23, but we're certainly seeing that momentum taking us forward a little bit faster than what we saw when we set that target.

Operator

Next question from Samuel McKinney with KeyBanc.

Samuel McKinney

Can you hear me?

Jugal Vijayvargiya

Yes. We can hear you now.

Samuel McKinney

Consumer electronics sales, they didn't change much sequentially. Can you provide us with the latest on the path back to normalized volumes for the Precision Clad, and any more details behind the timing that you cited in the slide?

Jugal Vijayvargiya

Yes. So on PMI, we indicated, I think, last time, and I would say the same, that is that we are at production levels that are -- that were there prior to the quality issue in Q4 that we had. So we continue to make good progress. And I think we'll continue to be at those levels here as we enter Q4 as well. So really, the rest of the consumer electronics is a smaller portion of our business. It fluctuates just based on timing and things quarter-to-quarter. So I wouldn't really put too much focus on the rest of the business, but we've made great progress on the PMI front, and we are at the production levels or slightly even better than what we were prior to the quality issue taking place in Q4.

Samuel McKinney

And then certainly, your goal is to outpace the general end market, but the semiconductor value-added sales blew that out. It increased 20% sequentially. Can you just talk about how you view sustainability of that quarterly value-added sales figure safely above $90 million and what in particular drove such massive growth this quarter?

Jugal Vijayvargiya

Well, I mean, part of the semiconductor change, as you can imagine, a little bit of timing. But I think in general, our teams have done a fantastic job of not only, as you said, growing with the market, but actually gaining share and winning new business. And certainly value-based pricing is a part of that as well. So we typically compare ourselves to wafer starts. Wafer starts are projected to be somewhere in the 11-ish percent on a year-over-year basis. Our year-to-date sales are roughly around north of 25%, so maybe around 26% on semiconductor. The quarter was at 40%. We continue to have great momentum in high-performance computing and making sure that our products are being used on the smaller node, high bandwidth memory, lower or smaller node chips.

We continue to have great pursuit in data storage, making sure we're gaining share and becoming a larger part on the data storage side. And a number of other, I would say, growth initiatives. When you look at our ALD portfolio, we've talked about the atomic position portfolio, strong growth in that business and continues to do well. So it is really, I would say, a broad-based growth on the semiconductor side in sort of all the subverticals of semiconductor with almost twice or actually a little bit more than twice the wafer start projections for the year when you look at it on a year-to-date basis.

I think we're well positioned. Your question about sustainability, I think we're well positioned to participate in the semiconductor space as we go forward. And so we'll put that together in Q4 and kind of get a feel for where we think '27 is going to be. But I think in general, we are well positioned to be in these subcategories of semiconductor.

Operator

Next question from David Silver with Freedom Capital Markets.

David Silver

So a very robust outlook that you've painted. I'm kind of scratching my head, and I'm going to maybe ask you about resourcing maybe from a somewhat different angle. But I've heard you say the -- discuss the diversity of end markets that you're now serving and the increasing share of what you call highly differentiated products that you're working on. And when I do look at your financial -- your income statement, I mean, your R&D spend is kind of flat with the year before and lower than a couple of years ago.

And I'm just wondering about whether from a talent issue, you have the resources in-house to kind of support what seems to be very strong growth and very impressive string of new business wins. I mean, with that order book, I think, comes the thinking about how to service the customers, not just the immediate order, but longer term. So maybe discuss the collaborative nature of your R&D or technical support? And what should we think about in terms of your resourcing at the R&D or technical support level going forward?

Jugal Vijayvargiya

Yes. Great question and one that I think we continue to be very focused on and making sure we're making all the right investments in the growth areas, and I'm convinced that we are. We are continuing to leverage, in fact, our partners. So when you see our R&D spending, keep in mind that as we leverage our partners, customers, governments, consortiums, et cetera, we are looking at more of a net spending. And so our gross spending continues to be good. We continue to make sure that the right things are being done and focused on. At the same time, we also have AI-related activities. I mean we're using sort of technology or AI-related activities to sort of augment, I think, on the R&D side.

When we also look at, I think, I'll call it R&D or you mentioned the collaborative nature, our sales and marketing efforts are much more technical, right? So you don't have a typical sales organization. We have technical sales. So when we look at our overall pursuit of business, you're looking at the technical sales side, technical marketing, the R&D, the funding that's happening from external sources and now certainly leveraging AI tools to be able to drive more efficiency and more productivity in our R&D side. So I'm convinced that we're making the right type of investments to be able to support the order book that's coming in, the backlog that's happening and I think being able to deliver in a really nice way to our customers.

David Silver

If I could just ask, you have -- I think Daniel or another questioner talked about your proactive, I would say, investments in adding new capacity a little bit ahead of demand and whatnot. If you were to kind of look at your footprint, your global footprint. You added capacity in Korea and whatnot and in electronic materials more broadly. Is it the case that you want to be as close to your customers as possible as you build out, let's say, electronic materials? Or is this the case where you think that the footprint that you've established right now will sustain your growth trajectory, let's say, for the next couple of years at least?

Jugal Vijayvargiya

Yes. I think we're going to do both, right? We want to have these core centers of expertise that we have established in our electronic materials business and our other businesses as well, but I'll focus on electronic materials since that's what you mentioned. We've established sort of core centers of expertise for each of our facilities. At the same time, we want to make investments, and we have done that. The most recent being the investment that we made in Korea, where we are putting in capacity outside the U.S., close to our customers. We have made investments in our facility in Europe to make sure that we can support the growth that is there. And we'll continue to look for both organic investments, but then also M&A investments.

We want to make sure that we're leveraging -- I mean you've seen kind of what we've been able to do with our balance sheet, and we want to be able to leverage that to be able to do perhaps more capacity-related M&A near to our customers like you mentioned. So I think we want to leverage both -- best of both worlds where we have core centers of expertise. But then at the same time, we have local manufacturing to be able to support our customers in region.

Operator

We have reached the end of the question-and-answer session, and I will turn the call back over to Kyle Kelleher for closing remarks.

Kyle Kelleher

Thank you. This concludes our third quarter 2026 earnings call. A recorded playback of this call will be available on the company's website, materion.com. I'd like to thank you for participating on this call and your interest in Materion. I'll be available for any follow-up questions. My number is (216) 383-4931. Thank you again.

Operator

Thank you. This concludes today's conference, and you may disconnect your lines at this time. Thank you for your participation.