Cuộc họp công bố kết quả kinh doanh Q3 2026 của Qnity (Q): Doanh thu tăng 22%, nâng dự báo

Điểm chính

• Doanh thu thuần quý 3/2026 đạt 1,6 tỷ USD, tăng 22% so với cùng kỳ năm ngoái và 9% so với quý trước. EBITDA hoạt động đã điều chỉnh tăng 36% lên 503 triệu USD.
• EPS đã điều chỉnh tăng 55% so với cùng kỳ năm ngoái và 23% so với quý trước lên 1,46 USD, nhờ sản lượng cao hơn, đòn bẩy hoạt động và cơ cấu sản phẩm thuận lợi.
• Mảng Công nghệ Bán dẫn mang lại 797 triệu USD doanh thu, trong khi Mảng Giải pháp Kết nối đạt 759 triệu USD. Nhu cầu liên quan đến AI đã hỗ trợ các tiến trình tiên tiến, đóng gói tiên tiến, quản lý nhiệt và bo mạch in AI.
• Ban lãnh đạo đã nâng dự báo doanh thu thuần cả năm lên 5,77 tỷ USD – 5,83 tỷ USD và dự báo EPS đã điều chỉnh lên 4,95–5,05 USD.
• Qnity cho biết việc được lựa chọn là chuẩn quy trình (process-of-record) cho công nghệ 2 nanomet và HBM4 đang bắt đầu đi vào sản xuất. Các chứng nhận này thường tạo ra nhu cầu định kỳ trong 5 đến 10 năm.
• Ban lãnh đạo dự kiến doanh thu thuần quý 4 sẽ tăng khoảng 26% so với cùng kỳ năm ngoái tại điểm giữa của khoảng dự báo, đồng thời tính đến yếu tố mùa vụ thông thường của ngành điện tử tiêu dùng và việc quản lý hàng tồn kho cuối năm.

Dữ liệu tài chính cốt lõi

Kết quả Kinh doanh và Hoạt động

Công nghệ Bán dẫn

Mảng Công nghệ Bán dẫn ghi nhận doanh số quý 3 đạt 797 triệu USD, tăng 15% so với cùng kỳ năm ngoái và 7% so với quý trước. Tăng trưởng doanh số tự thân đạt 16%, trong khi biên lợi nhuận gộp đã điều chỉnh đạt 50,2% và EBITDA hoạt động đã điều chỉnh đạt 285 triệu USD.

Danh mục tiến trình tiên tiến tăng 25% so với cùng kỳ năm ngoái và chiếm khoảng 44% doanh thu liên quan đến bán dẫn, tăng từ mức 42% trong nửa đầu năm 2026. Ban lãnh đạo cho rằng sự tăng trưởng này đến từ nhu cầu chip logic và bộ nhớ tiên tiến, tỷ lệ sử dụng công suất nhà máy gia công chip cao hơn và cường độ sử dụng vật liệu gia tăng.

Qnity cho biết công ty đang trên đà vượt kỷ lục năm ngoái về số lượng hợp đồng quy trình sản xuất chuẩn (process-of-record), trong đó hầu hết gắn liền với sự chuyển dịch "thu nhỏ và xếp chồng" trong ngành bán dẫn. Các hợp đồng thắng thầu gần đây bao gồm 2 nanomet và HBM4 công nghệ bước vào giai đoạn sản xuất.

Công ty đang theo dõi hơn 15 nhà máy gia công chip tiên tiến và một số nhà máy gia công chip tiến trình trưởng thành mục tiêu đi vào sản xuất trong năm tới. Ban lãnh đạo lưu ý rằng quá trình kiểm định quy trình có thể mất 12 đến 18 tháng sau khi lắp đặt thiết bị, sau đó nhu cầu vật liệu sẽ tăng lên khi sản xuất được đẩy mạnh quy mô.

Mảng kinh doanh vật tư tiêu hao thiết bị bán dẫn Kalrez cũng tăng hơn 20%. Ban lãnh đạo mô tả Kalrez chiếm khoảng mười mấy phần trăm doanh số của Mảng Công nghệ Bán dẫn, với nhu cầu gắn liền với việc lắp đặt thiết bị lắng đọng và khắc, tỷ lệ sử dụng công suất nhà máy gia công chip và nhu cầu thay thế định kỳ.

Giải pháp Kết nối

Mảng Giải pháp Kết nối đã ghi nhận 759 triệu USD doanh thu trong quý 3, tăng 30% so với cùng kỳ năm ngoái và 11% so với quý trước. Tăng trưởng hữu cơ đạt 29%, biên lợi nhuận gộp điều chỉnh đạt 45,3%, và EBITDA hoạt động điều chỉnh đạt 236 triệu USD.

Quản lý nhiệt, đóng gói nâng cao và PCB cho AI chiếm nhỉnh hơn 30% doanh số của mảng và tăng tổng cộng hơn 50% trong quý. Quản lý nhiệt là nền tảng lớn nhất trong ba nền tảng này, tiếp theo là đóng gói nâng cao và PCB cho AI.

Phần còn lại của Mảng Giải pháp Kết nối tăng trưởng ở mức khoảng 15%, nhờ sự hỗ trợ từ lớp chắn nhiễu điện từ (EMI) cho các ứng dụng ô tô và trung tâm dữ liệu, mạch điện độ tin cậy cao cho hàng không vũ trụ và quốc phòng, cùng việc gia tăng hàm lượng công nghệ trong các sản phẩm điện tử tiêu dùng cao cấp.

Ban lãnh đạo đánh giá quản lý nhiệt là nền tảng tăng trưởng nhanh nhất của Qnity. Mật độ chip và năng lực tính toán ngày càng tăng đang làm tăng nhu cầu về vật liệu tản nhiệt trên các chip, gói đóng gói, bo mạch và các hệ thống rộng lớn hơn.

Dự báo của Ban Lãnh đạo

Qnity đã nâng triển vọng cho cả năm 2026:

Mức trung vị của dự báo doanh thu tăng 200 triệu USD, trong khi mức trung vị của EPS điều chỉnh tăng 0,50 USD.

Tại mức trung vị mới cập nhật, ban lãnh đạo dự kiến đạt khoảng 22% tăng trưởng doanh số cả năm, hơn 28% tăng trưởng EBITDA điều chỉnh và khoảng 50% tăng trưởng EPS điều chỉnh. Mảng Công nghệ Bán dẫn và Giải pháp Kết nối dự kiến sẽ tăng trưởng lần lượt khoảng 15% và 30% trong năm 2026.

Ban lãnh đạo kỳ vọng mức tăng trưởng lượt bắt đầu sản xuất phiến bán dẫn (MSI wafer-start) năm 2026 sẽ nằm trong khoảng từ một chữ số mức cao đến hai chữ số mức thấp. Giả định cơ sở hiện tại của công ty cho năm 2027 cũng nằm trong khoảng tương tự, mặc dù công ty chưa đưa ra dự báo chính thức cho năm 2027.

Qnity tiếp tục đặt mục tiêu 450 triệu – 470 triệu USDchi tiêu vốn. Một số khoản chi tiêu có thể chuyển sang Quý 1 do thời điểm thực hiện dự án. Ban lãnh đạo cho biết các dự án mở rộng công suất đang được triển khai và công ty dự kiến có đủ công suất để đáp ứng sản lượng năm 2027 và tăng trưởng hơn nữa trong năm 2028.

Rủi ro và các yếu tố cần theo dõi

• Dự báo Quý 4 đã bao gồm tính mùa vụ thông thường của ngành điện tử tiêu dùng và khả năng quản lý tồn kho cuối năm của khách hàng.
• Sự suy yếu ở các thiết bị tiêu dùng phân khúc thấp và trung cấp vẫn là rào cản của ngành, mặc dù Qnity cho biết mức độ ảnh hưởng của công ty tập trung vào các sản phẩm cao cấp có khả năng phục hồi tốt hơn.
• Thời điểm tăng trưởng phụ thuộc một phần vào việc khách hàng thương mại hóa thành công các công nghệ tiên tiến và đưa công suất mới vào vận hành theo đúng kế hoạch.
• Doanh thu vật liệu mới liên quan đến nhà máy sản xuất chip (fab) có thể mất thời gian để phát triển vì quá trình kiểm định quy trình thường đòi hỏi 12 đến 18 tháng sau khi lắp đặt thiết bị.
• Một số khoản chi tiêu vốn có thể chuyển sang Quý 1 do yếu tố thời điểm, mặc dù ban lãnh đạo vẫn giữ nguyên khoảng mục tiêu cả năm.

Điểm nhấn phiên Hỏi & Đáp với chuyên gia phân tích

Lộ trình biên lợi nhuận gộp: Ban lãnh đạo cho biết lộ trình hướng tới biên lợi nhuận gộp trên 50% sẽ phụ thuộc vào cơ cấu sản phẩm có giá trị cao hơn, năng suất và hiệu suất sử dụng nhà máy, cũng như việc thu được giá trị tương xứng từ các công nghệ mới. Chưa có mốc thời gian cụ thể nào được đưa ra.

Cơ cấu tiến trình tiên tiến: Các tiến trình tiên tiến hiện chiếm khoảng 44% doanh thu liên quan đến bán dẫn. Ban lãnh đạo dự kiến tỷ trọng này sẽ đạt 50% trước khi kết thúc thập kỷ, được hỗ trợ bởi các hợp đồng quy trình ghi nhận (process-of-record) và công suất tiến trình tiên tiến mới.

Tính bền vững của tăng trưởng: Qnity cho biết việc tiếp tục đạt hiệu suất vượt trội so với MSI phụ thuộc vào việc khách hàng mở rộng quy mô các công nghệ tiên tiến và hoàn thành việc mở rộng công suất đúng tiến độ. Các hợp đồng quy trình ghi nhận hiện tại mang lại tầm nhìn rõ ràng vì chúng có thể duy trì sản xuất từ 5 đến 10 năm.

AI và trung tâm dữ liệu: Ban lãnh đạo dự kiến đà tăng trưởng sẽ tiếp tục từ khoản đầu tư vào trung tâm dữ liệu, đồng thời nhận thấy việc ứng dụng AI mở rộng sang tự động hóa nhà máy, hàng không vũ trụ và quốc phòng, xe tự lái, máy móc và thiết bị biên.

Phân bổ vốn: Đầu tư tự thân vẫn là ưu tiên hàng đầu, tiếp theo là hoạt động M&A tập trung vào công nghệ một cách có kỷ luật và mang lại lợi nhuận cho cổ đông thông qua cổ tức và mua lại cổ phiếu. Qnity đã hoàn trả 125 triệu USD cho cổ đông thông qua cổ tức và mua lại cổ phiếu từ đầu năm đến nay.

Toàn văn Biên bản Cuộc họp Báo cáo Kết quả Kinh doanh

Toàn văn cuộc gọi công bố kết quả kinh doanh

Phần trình bày của ban lãnh đạo

Operator

Good morning, and welcome to the Qnity Third Quarter 2026 Conference and Webcast Call. [Operator Instructions] Please also be advised that today's call is being recorded. I will now turn the call over to Meg Miller, Vice President of Global Communications. You may begin.

Meg Miller

Thank you, and welcome to our Third Quarter 2026 Earnings Call. Joining me today are Jon Kemp, our Chief Executive Officer; and Ken Rizvi, our Chief Financial Officer, who joined us just a few weeks ago. Earlier today, we issued our earnings release along with the supplemental slide presentation, which can be found on our Investor Relations website.

Before we begin, I'd like to remind you that today's discussion will include some forward-looking statements. These statements represent our best view of predictions and expectations for the future, but numerous risks and uncertainties may cause actual results to differ. Please refer to our earnings release and SEC filings for a discussion of these risks. We'll also be discussing certain non-GAAP financial measures, and I refer you to our earnings materials for information regarding our non-GAAP financial measures and reconciliations to the most directly comparable GAAP measure.

With that, it's my pleasure to turn it over to Jon.

Jon Kemp

Thank you, Meg, and good morning, everyone. Let me start by introducing you to Ken Rizvi, our new CFO. Ken brings a proven track record as a public company CFO as well as significant experience in the semi industry. While Ken has only been with us a few weeks it's clear that he shares our commitment to growth, operating discipline and long-term value creation. He's already been engaging and I'm pleased to have him with us today as we build on the progress of our first year as an independent company.

Over the past 12 months, we've executed a focused strategy that builds on more than 50 years of technology leadership to become the premier solutions provider across the semiconductor value chain. That strategy is delivering results as AI accelerates two industry shifts, shrink and stack. The next era of computing is being shaped, not only by smaller, more powerful chips, but also by stacking more of them into 3D architectures.

As designed to add layers and complexity, materials intensity multiplies, making our innovation even more critical to performance, yield and reliability. This is a powerful long-term growth driver and means more opportunity content in every device.

Our broad portfolio, deep customer relationships and local execution model enable us to engage early with system-level solutions from the front end to the back end. As the pace and magnitude of industry capital investments increase, this means additional content and share gain opportunities. As customers scale, our design win enables durable growth and attractive returns for our shareholders.

Our third quarter results provide clear evidence that this strategy is translating into strong financial performance. Net sales were $1.6 billion, with organic growth of 22% year-over-year. Adjusted operating EBITDA was $503 million, growing 36% year-over-year. And adjusted earnings per share increased 55% year-over-year to $1.46. This marked our tenth consecutive quarter of profitable organic growth, reinforcing our technology leadership and consistent execution.

In Semiconductor Technologies, we had strong performance with organic sales growth of 16% year-over-year and an adjusted EBITDA margin of 36% and Advanced Logic and Memory remained impactful drivers of our strong quarterly results, higher fab utilization and advanced notice skinning drug demand for our semi fab materials.

In addition, demand for [ Kalrez ], our semiconductor equipment consumables business, primarily tied to deposition and etch has grown significantly this year.

Interconnect Solutions had another great quarter with organic sales growth of 29% year-over-year and an adjusted EBITDA margin of 31%. Thermal management, Advanced Packaging and AI Printed Circuit Boards remain the segment's fastest-growing platforms driven by AI tailwinds and rising data center demand.

Our third quarter results show that we're executing well. Our technology is delivering value for customers and the transition to shrink and stack is creating meaningful opportunities for our business.

Qnity has one of the industry's broadest material solutions portfolios, spanning front-end materials used to manufacture advanced chips through back-end Advanced Packaging, Interconnect and Thermal Solutions. That breadth positions us to solve increasingly complex challenges across the chip and broader system. In Advanced Packaging, Qnity is helping drive a major shift in semiconductor performance. Our integrated platform spans semi-fab materials like [ CMPM ] lithography as well as interconnect material flight [ planing ] technologies, dielectrics and fine line patterning.

There solutions enable a high-performance integration and complex manufacturing processes required for advanced packaging architectures like [ CoWoS ], [ EMIB ] and HBM. Increasing materials intensity expands our content per package, enabling Qnity to grow faster than overall package volumes. We're also working with customers earlier in the design process than ever before on future architectures like panel-level packaging, hybrid bonding and glass core substrates, those earlier conversations allow us to bring our industry-leading portfolio and deep engineering expertise together into system-level solutions that help customers improve yields, accelerate development and scale next-generation architectures.

Thermal management is our fastest-growing platform and has become fundamental to AI performance. For example, as more powerful logic chips and memory modules are tightly packed into AI applications, heat builds quickly and can limit performance and reliability. Our expansive portfolio manages heat at every level from the chip and memory components to the Board and broader system, giving us more opportunities to help customers optimize system efficiency and maximize AI compute.

Our decade-long experience gives us a deep understanding of customer road maps and where devices are headed so we can bring together the right materials and engineering expertise for their most critical solutions.

Through Apple's American manufacturing program, we're advancing materials and technologies for semiconductor manufacturing and advanced electronics, including two U.S.-produced camera films for the variable aperture camera system in the iPhone 18 Pro.

The innovation examples I shared become a lasting growth engine when our materials earn a place in a customer's manufacturing process. That's the power of a process of record or POR and why they're at the heart of our business model.

Once our material is qualified in a customer's process, it can generate repeatable revenue through the life of that technology. Here's what that means. On average, our PORs last 5 to 10 years and as production scales every wafer or system creates steady, repeatable demand.

Let me give you one example of how we're seeing that model play up today. We've secured multiple POR wins across today's leading technologies for Advanced Nodes, Advanced Packaging and Thermal Management. These wins are driving substantial growth with more capacity still to come, both this year and in 2027. More recently, we've strengthened our leadership position with an increasing number of significant POR wins for 2-nanometer and HBM4, which are now entering production. Each technology transition results in higher materials intensity and more content per wafer.

We are actively engaged in the next wave of growth with the new generations of advanced logic and memory. Overall, we're on pace to exceed last year's record POR wins with the majority tied to shrink and stack inflections. That progression from early customer engagement to qualification, production and years of repeatable revenue gives us confidence in durable multiyear growth across the stack.

Beyond our leading POR positions, the industry trends we're seeing reinforce our confidence in the growth trajectory ahead. First, healthy customer utilization is supporting demand for our consumables today. Advanced logic and DRAM fabs are tracking in the high 80% range, while NAND and mainstream logic continue to improve with most customers in the low to mid-80s.

Second, customers are investing in new capacity to address strengthening demand across the semiconductor value chain. We're tracking more than 15 advanced fabs and a handful of mature node fabs with production targeted within the next year. For our business, the key timing is when those facilities start running wafers. Once equipment is installed, process qualification can take 12 to 18 months. From there, materials demand builds as customers ramp toward full capacity.

While the scale of the industry build-out is significant, the increase in total wafer volume will come over time. For Qnity, that creates a multiyear opportunity as our qualified material scale with customer production and reinforces our confidence over the long term.

Finally, AI adoption is broadening beyond data centers into physical AI across factory automation, aerospace and defense and autonomous driving. Our materials help enable these applications, extending our growth opportunities across a more diverse set of end markets.

Now let me pass it over to Ken to cover our results in more depth.

Ken Rizvi

Thank you, Jon, and good morning. I'm very excited to be here with you and the talented team at Qnity.

In my first month, what has stood out most is a unique combination of our industry-leading materials portfolio that spans a semiconductor ecosystem. Our commitment to innovation and a culture focused on winning through collaboration and execution.

Materials innovation makes every new generation of chips and broader system improvements possible. In Qnity sits at the center of this. As Jon highlighted earlier, by partnering with customers early on their technology road maps, we have an ability to secure POR wins that can provide years of repeatable revenue and give us the confidence in our ability to drive long-term sustainable growth in our business.

I'm excited to partner with Jon and the leadership team to ensure we allocate capital with discipline and maximize the value from the innovations we enable.

Beyond revenue growth, we will be increasingly focused on improving our gross margin profile in driving long-term earnings per share expansion.

From a capital allocation perspective, our priorities remain the same. Our first priority is to continue strengthening our organic business and to further scale our industry-leading positions.

Second, we will evaluate opportunities to augment our portfolio through M&A, but we'll remain disciplined and returns focused in our approach. Our thermal business layer is an excellent example of this approach.

And finally, we will continue to return capital back to our shareholders through share repurchases and dividends while maintaining a strong and resilient balance sheet.

Now let me turn to our performance in the third quarter. We delivered another quarter of strong results. Net sales were $1.6 billion, an increase of 22% and year-over-year and 9% sequentially. Adjusted gross margin was 47.8%, up 270 basis points year-over-year and 120 basis points sequentially. Adjusted operating EBITDA was $503 million, up 36% year-over-year and 17% sequentially. And adjusted EBITDA margin [indiscernible].

Adjusted earnings per share for the third quarter was $1.46, up 55% year-over-year and 23% sequentially. The combination of strong volumes, operating leverage and favorable mix supported our overall financial performance.

Now turning to our segment results for both semiconductor technologies and interconnect solutions. Both segments delivered their highest net sales and adjusted operating EBITDA of the year.

Semiconductor Technologies had net sales of $797 million in the third quarter, an increase of 15% year-over-year and 7% sequentially. Semiconductor Technologies adjusted gross margins for the quarter were 50.2%, adjusted operating net $285 million for the third quarter.

The [indiscernible] or advanced nodes portfolio, which grew 25% year-over-year and now represents approximately 44% of our semiconductor-related revenue up from 42% in the first half of the year.

In our Interconnect Solutions segment, we delivered net sales of $759 million in the third quarter an increase of 30% year-over-year and 11% sequentially. Interconnect Solutions adjusted gross margin for the quarter were 45.3% and adjusted operating EBITDA was $236 million for the third quarter.

Thermal management, advanced packaging and AI PCBs continued their strong momentum and were helped by consumer electronics seasonal builds during the quarter.

Now let me turn to our balance sheet and cash flow metrics. We exited the third quarter with cash and cash equivalents of $1.1 billion. Adjusted free cash flow generation was strong at $320 million, bringing us to $607 million of adjusted free cash flow year-to-date. This reflects strong operating performance and execution of our disciplined capital allocation strategy.

Our total debt outstanding is approximately $4 billion, with net leverage at approximately 1.7 [ turns ]. Capital expenditures were $78 million for the quarter and $290 million year-to-date as we continue to invest in our organic growth initiatives. For the year, we expect to invest approximately $450 million.

We also continue to deliver capital returns to shareholders through our quarterly dividend and $25 million of share repurchases during the quarter. Year-to-date, we have returned $125 million through share repurchases and our dividend.

Turning to our outlook. We are raising our full year revenue expectations by $200 million and adjusted EPS by $0.50 at the midpoint. Our full year outlook reflects our strong continued momentum and expectations of 2026 MSI wafer start growth to be in the high single-digit to low double-digit range increasing from previous expectations. Building on our strong year-to-date results, we're raising our full year outlook. Net sales is now expected to be between $5. 77 billion To $5.83 billion. Adjusted operating EBITDA is now expected to be between $1.785 billion to $1.805 billion. And adjusted EPS is now expected to be between $4.95 to $5.05. And finally, adjusted free cash flow is now expected to be between $800 million to $900 million.

Based on our guidance for the fourth quarter, we're expecting another strong quarter of year-over-year performance with approximately 26% net sales growth at the midpoint.

In the semi and ICS segments for 2026, we expect the strong year-over-year growth momentum to continue at approximately 15% and 30%, respectively, at the midpoint of our guidance. Our guidance also takes into account normal seasonality and customer inventory management at year-end.

At the midpoint of our updated guidance for the full year, we now expect to deliver 22% net sales growth, over 28% adjusted EBITDA growth and adjusted EPS growth of approximately 50%.

Jon, I'll turn it back to you.

Jon Kemp

Thank you, Ken. Our first year as an independent company has shown our ability to translate strategy into measurable results that strengthen our ability to deliver durable, profitable growth. We bolstered our end-to-end portfolio with a broad range of innovations and new product launches, reinforcing our position as an industry technology leader.

We've invested in targeting capacity expansion in attractive high-growth areas like CMP solutions, lithography and thermal management. Aligned with customer road maps and supported by POR wins and disciplined return expectations. And we deepened customer and ecosystem partnerships with industry leaders engaging earlier than ever in the innovation cycle, creating sustainable pathways to grow future content and share.

More recently, our inclusion in the Philadelphia semiconductor index places us among important peer groups, reflecting our critical role across the semiconductor value chain. Together, these milestones demonstrate clear growth principles and best where we have differentiated technology and visible customer demand partnered closely with customers to earn critical design selections and scale efficiently as those programs move into production.

As we look forward to 2027, my conversations with customers reinforce confidence in the strength of demand and the momentum ahead. We expect the acceleration we've seen in 2026 to continue as AI, advanced nodes and system integration expands the challenges our materials can solve.

We're still early in this evolution, with meaningful runway as customers bring next-generation chips and systems into high-volume production. Thank you to our customers for their trust and collaboration. And to our people who continue to execute with focus and discipline to capture the opportunities ahead.

Operator, you can open the line for questions.

Operator

[Operator Instructions] And we'll take our first question from Jim Schneider with Goldman Sachs.

Phần hỏi đáp

James Schneider

As you think about the Q4 guidance you provided? And then into the first part of next year, you talked about inventory management at year-end. That's normal seasonality for you. Maybe talk about what you're seeing in terms of customer order patterns for Q1? And how should we be thinking about -- remind us of your normal Q1 seasonality and sort of like what you would think you'd be able to perform better or worse than that sort of given the multiple moving pieces with the strength in Interconnect offset by some consumer electronics weakness.

Ken Rizvi

Jim, it's Ken. And thank you for the call, part of the question here. We are really excited about the year. As you saw, our guidance was up by $200 million the $5.8 billion. And if you look, what does that imply for Q4? It means that our Q4 revenues are up 26% at the midpoint on a year-over-year basis. So we're seeing a continued strength on a year-over-year basis.

Where as you highlighted, we will see normal seasonality on the consumer portion of our business and potentially some customer inventory management at year-end that we ably see. As we head into Q1, we're not going to provide guidance for Q1. But what we would normally see is that in Q1, things would be up modestly. So in that kind of low single-digit range would be the historical trend from Q4 into Q1 based on historical patterns.

James Schneider

That's very helpful, Ken. It's good talk to you again. Maybe just as a follow-up, the gross margin execution was significantly better than last quarter. I know mix was playing a role in that.

And I believe, Jon, you had given some previous comments during the quarter about being able to take gross margins to sort of the 50% range over time. Maybe kind of talk about the path to get there on the time frame for achieving that.

Ken Rizvi

Sure. Maybe I'll start, and then I'll turn it over to Jon here, Jim. Thanks for the question again. So if you look at the margin profile of the company, we had actually great margins here in Q3 at 47.8%. And if you step back and look over the last year, we've seen tremendous improvement in our ICS market. So those have improved by north of 300 basis points if you looked from a year ago.

And so seeing improvement as a result of product mix improving across both segments, continued focus on operational excellence in our factories, and that is resulting in an improved margin profile for the company.

If you look at this year versus last year, based on the guidance for '26 versus '25, you can also see that our margins are improving. As we think about hitting that 50% mark, that will come over time, it will be a combination of those three factors. The continued focus on delivering advanced technologies, both within our semiconductor portfolio and our interconnect portfolio, a continued focus on operational excellence in our factories and getting the right absorption there.

And then customer engagement, really focusing on how we're engaging with our large customers and ensuring that we're getting the value for the technology we're delivering to the semiconductor ecosystem.

Jon Kemp

Thanks, Ken. The only thing I would add there is really the one of the trends that we're observing is the pace of innovation accelerating and that's giving us more opportunities to both increase content as well as accelerate the pace of new product introductions. When we launch new products, our focus has always been to make sure we're getting the value of the technology that we bring to the customers. And so as the pace of innovation accelerates, that gives us an opportunity to not only increase the content but also to increase the value, which also will translate to progress on that gross margin pathway. Thank you.

Operator

Our next question will come from Chris Parkinson with Wolfe Research.

Christopher Parkinson

Great. Jon, I'd love to hear your updated thoughts on kind of drilling down to that prior question. on aspects of your portfolio, there's been a lot going on this year naturally, but it seems like you're still carrying a lot of momentum across [ CMP ]. So I'd love to hear your thoughts on any differentiated in your outlook for your [ slurry ] portfolio versus [ pads ].

And then also if whether or not you're beginning to see even more momentum in some of the investments that you've been making in litho materials throughout the first half.

Jon Kemp

Yes, Chris, thanks for the question. I think broadly, starting at a high level, we're seeing -- we're really pleased with the progress that we're making across the company in all of our businesses. we're seeing really nice growth distribution coming from really almost all of the product lines.

Certainly, as we've talked about before, the [CMP ] materials have been some of the fastest-growing part of our portfolio. And I think what we're seeing, especially in the most advanced technologies, is the opportunity to engage with customers more at a system level perspective on how we can combine high-performing pads with cleans and slurries to create an overall solution that will help them improve performance, reliability and yield.

And particularly as we move into the most advanced nodes from three to two, and this becomes especially important as we get to those [ angstrom ] era nodes the number of conversations that we're having with customers on how to leverage create leverage across those technology platforms is increasing.

We've got nine POR wins in every business in the lithography business. I'm excited by with some recent progress that we've made, particularly in the memory space. And with some of the sub-layers around [ EUV ] lithography, where our teams continue to do exceptionally well, and we're really well positioned with customers as our customers start to bring more of their advanced technology to market, that will give us content rising content in every tech progress.

Christopher Parkinson

And just as a quick follow-up. Now that you're roughly, I guess, a few more days than a year-end. You've obviously been making a lot of investments that we're just discussing the first year as an independent company. Where are you the most happy? And how do those investments lead in to your conviction that you're going to be able to continuously outgrow MSI, PCB square meters and some of the things that you've been discussing on the conference circuit. I'd love to hear just thoughts 1 year in.

Jon Kemp

Thanks, Chris. Great question. reflect I'm super pleased with how the business has been performing. If I had to sum it up in one word, it would be momentum, right, and its momentum across a couple of areas. Obviously, we're really uniquely well positioned to be able to partner with customers across the semiconductor stack from the front end to the back end, which is really helping us capitalize on both the shrink and stack inflections.

Maybe two areas that I would highlight. Number 1 is the structural upgrade to the interconnect business with the pace and the magnitude that advanced packaging, AI PCBs and thermal that hit the market has just created a structural upgrade to that part of our portfolio, and you're seeing that momentum now over the last several quarters. And we expect that no structural changes to the back end of the semiconductor stack to continue because customers and OEMs are recognizing the value that it brings to the entire system level performance as we solve problems like signal integrity, power delivery and heat management.

Maybe the other thing is, obviously, with the increase that we've had in demand we've been able to operate with more speed and agility to make sure that we have the necessary capacity to meet that demand. You've seen us announce a couple of incremental capacity investments this year that we've been able to quickly respond to rising demand of our end partner with our customers to make sure that we have capacity projects efficient to be able to support to manage not only this year but into '27 and '28, keeping these elevated growth rates accelerating into the future.

Ken, anything else you'd add?

Ken Rizvi

Yes. So just two things to highlight just coming in, in the last month. When we look at the PORs, and Jon highlighted this earlier, the PORs that we have on the SP business are accelerating. What we're seeing today is really from wins that we got a couple of years ago.

So one of the things that I'm most excited about coming in is really that acceleration of those POR wins which have longevity, 5, 10 years plus many times. And then number 2 is the number of advanced nodes and advanced packaging fabs that are coming online here over the next 12-18 months. I think we highlighted, we're tracking 15-plus advanced fabs and advanced packaging fabs, those are going to use Qnity technology. They're going to use more content than some of the mature fabs. So we're really excited by the team and the R&D efforts of the entire team to partner with our customers and help accelerate that growth profile over the long term.

Operator

Our next question comes from John McNulty with BMO Capital Markets.

Unknown Analyst

This is Margarita on for John McNulty. And congrats on a great quarter. So within Interconnect Solutions, can you break down a little bit the relative growth contributions from packaging, PCB and thermal management? And how should we think about the sustainability of this growth moving into 2027?

Jon Kemp

Yes. Thanks, Margarita. That's a great question. So we're really pleased with the exceptional performance in our ICS segment, which has been a recurring theme all year, year-to-date, we've got 29% organic growth in the ICS segment. That's really being driven by AI-led demand rising advanced packaging and the structural upgrade to that part of the portfolio.

The easiest way to think about it is to think about what we talk about as kind of the big three growth drivers that are the fastest growing, highest value part of that platform and then kind of the rest of ICS.

So the big three, the largest of those three is thermal management and then advanced packaging and the AI PCB is the smallest. It's also kind of the newest growth engine. We were really happy in the third quarter. Those three combined represent a little bit about 30% of the total ICS segment, and they grew again by more than 50% during the third quarter.

So continuing that growth momentum that we've seen kind of throughout this year and excited about the increasing number of POR wins and the PORs that are stating as our customers continue to build out their technology road maps and the increasing number of system-level engagement that our teams are seeing.

When you think about the rest of ICS that we're still outcome forming the market significantly because what we're seeing is mid-teens growth in the rest of ICS, really driven by strong performance from our [ EMI ] shielding business from Laird across both automotive and data center applications reliability circuitry in places like aerospace and defense and strong performance in premium consumer electronics, which has been a much more resilient part of the market, combined with nice content gains.

So when you put all of that together, what we see broadly is rising system-level complexity that's creating a structural advantage over time for Qnity materials to solve key system-level challenges across signal integrity, power delivery and heat management across the technology stack.

Unknown Analyst

Great. And then specifically on the data center end market. Just curious as to how you're thinking about the sustainability of the build-out in the next few years. We've seen some reports of large project delays and just overall pushback around the pace of investment. So from Qnity's perspective, how durable do you see this growth?

Jon Kemp

Yes. Thanks, Margarita. We're certainly watching the trends in engaging with our customers on those topics as well. As I said in my prepared remarks, I believe that AI is the most transformative technology of our time, and we're still in the early days of adoption as AI capabilities, the high-performance computing start to penetrate every area of the modern economy.

Obviously, a lot of that growth in the early days of AI has been driven by data center. And we're seeing within data centers, we're seeing an accelerating adoption of the most advanced technologies across both shrink and stack. That our conversations with customers suggest that demand is strong with an increasing number of engagements and rising material intensity and we expect there to be healthy momentum as we go into next year within data center.

But it's not just a data center story. What we're also excited about is increasing activity as we see AI capabilities move from the cloud to the edge in physical AI across machines, vehicles, and devices. They're taking those same shrink and stack technology and deploying it inside those architectures as well, leaving us really well positioned to pick up rising content in each one of those application areas.

So maybe just to summarize that, we see significant momentum for AI and high-performance compute across the semi industry. And Qnity is well positioned to capture really a multiyear growth opportunity across the technology stack, from front end to back end regardless of the end market in which it appears.

Operator

Our next question will come from Frank Mitsch with Fermium Research.

Frank Mitsch

Yes, another impressive quarter. I wanted to come back on the advanced node side and to come back to the question of the sustainability of growth because we've seen couple of quarters here, 20% plus growth in advanced nodes. And you highlighted that you got the 44% of the portfolio in the third quarter.

You had outlined at Investor Day your near-term or midterm target to get to 50% of the portfolio in advanced nodes. And just curious, as you look at the landscape today, a, what's the sustainability of that growth? And b, when do you think you'll get to that 50% intermediate-term target?

Jon Kemp

Yes, Frank great question. So really happy with the progress that we're making across our semiconductor portfolio. We've got PORs that are staying in every product line there. And most of them are really targeted at the most advanced technologies.

So obviously, what we're seeing this year is the confluence of the power of that innovation engine and those PORs that really were on in kind of 2023 and 2024 is when we won a platter skiing this year. And what I'm pleased to see is across all of the advanced logic and all of the advanced memory players they're having some success in scaling their most advanced technology. And that's been a significant accelerator of the growth of that part of our portfolio.

When I think about the POR, we typically work on things 2 to 3 years in advance. So the record PORs that we had last year and really happy we're on pace to exceed that record POR wins this year, that's really looking towards the future. And those are for [ angstrom ] era nodes across 16, 14 and even 10. So when I combine the number of POR wins that our business is seeing with the impressive fab build-out that we talked about with more than a dozen advanced node fabs and advanced packaging fabs that are taking place that will start to scale over the next few years. That's what gives me confidence in our ability to continue generating outsized growth our advanced node portfolio.

And clearly, we're going to reach that 50% threshold well before the end of the decade, like we talked about at Investor Day.

Frank Mitsch

Terrific. That's very helpful. And Ken, nice to meet you over the phone. You highlighted that your net debt -- your net leverage is down to 1.7x. I'm curious as you look at the portfolio, what is -- what do you feel is the optimal leverage ratio for Qnity to have? And any comments you want to make about capital allocation around that, that would be helpful.

Ken Rizvi

Yes. Sure, Frank, and thanks, and good to meet you. I would say if we step back, you're spot on that 1.7 turns what we've said is we want to keep that below 3 turns on a net basis. historically, and we're in very strong position based on the EBITDA we're generating as a company based on our cash position. So a very strong balance sheet today.

In terms of the allocation priorities, it goes back to some of the comments I made in the prepared remarks. So first and foremost, it's really to continue investing in the organic business. We see, as Jon highlighted earlier, such great opportunities to continue to scale our leadership positions in these critical and key markets for the semiconductor ecosystem.

Number two, we will continue to look at ways that we can augment our portfolio from a technology standpoint, but do so in a very disciplined manner in terms of M&A then Laird is an excellent example of that.

And then finally, returning capital back to shareholders. And we've done that over the course of the last 9 months or so, we've returned about $125 million vis-a-vis dividends and share repurchases.

So the priorities remain the same. I would say, coming in what I am most excited about is the opportunity we have to continue to enhance our leadership position in materials innovation. It's really a fantastic team, a fantastic R&D engine that we have here. So really excited about the future.

Operator

Our next question will come from [ Alex Yefremov ] with Barclays.

Unknown Analyst

Thanks. Good morning, everyone. This is a long-winded question, so I apologize in advance. You're outgrowing MSI and semi business by about 5 points this year. And then your related theaters packaging business is growing at sort of 3x of your semi business.

So the two parts are, one, can you say business keep on growing by 500 basis points or higher. And then should we think about your thermal and packaging business sort of scaling about the same rate? So 3x of the semi business over the next year or 2?

Ken Rizvi

Yes. Let me address the first part of the question, and I'll turn it back over to Jon here. So this is Ken, nice to meet you virtually here.

If we look at the overall MSI number that we're seeing from '26, we talked about a high single-digit, low double-digit type of growth rate. And our current expectations for next year would be in that similar ballpark based on what we're seeing today. Obviously, that can change. So that's how we would frame the overall MSI numbers. And our goal is obviously to do better than MSI based on the content we are providing for advanced nodes and advanced technologies.

In terms of the ICS business, we have had great momentum if we think about 2026 versus 2025 or if you look at Q3 versus Q3, we won't call a specific number in terms of the growth rates there, but also continue to outperform the underlying markets, and we've seen this uptake in the big three around our thermal products around our AI PCBs and around our advanced packaging. Those have really driven a lot of the growth profile over the last 9 months of this year, and we'd expect to continue to see nice growth as we head into 2027.

Jon Kemp

Maybe [indiscernible] -- good question. And maybe what I would add to that is the way we think about it is the outperformance is really driven primarily by the ability of our customers to scale their most advanced technologies.

So as you think about -- and that's a combination of staying their technologies as well as bringing the expected capacity expansion online in a timely fashion. So what I would say is assuming that our customers are successful with commercializing their technology road maps. As I talked about before in the prior question, we've already secured the POR wins for a lot of those advanced technologies the scale and if the timing of those capacity expansions is what we expect, then the magnitude of the outperformance will be sustained.

Unknown Analyst

Very helpful. And I guess it's not very hard to imagine that growth rate next year was very high as well, maybe similar to this year. If we are in this kind of pretty high gross world. Do you have enough capacity today or over the next year to serve, let's call it, 20% growth or so what do you be constrained in any meaningful way?

Ken Rizvi

Yes. So let me take the first piece, and I think Jon is going to take the second piece on supply here in terms of the industry. We're not going to call 2027 today in terms of guidance, right? We have guided for '26. You've seen based on our guidance, really strong performance on a year-over-year basis, something in the neighborhood of 22% growth at the midpoint for '26 versus 2025.

As we look into next year, I think one of the baseline assumptions that we currently have today is around that MSI figure. So that today, we assume it's going to be in that high single-digit range, maybe into the low double digits. We'll have to see how that plays out. And then for the ICS events, as I mentioned before, continuing to invest and looking to scale that business into 2027.

But we'll provide a little bit more context on our next earnings call in terms of the specifics around the guide for 2027.

Yes. In terms of our capacity, and I alluded to this a bit earlier, we have healthy capacity to support growth. We do have a handful of select projects where because the growth rates have been so high, we have accelerated some of our investments to make sure that we have the sufficient capacity to meet demand. Those projects are well underway and in flight. So we feel good about our ability to support 2027 volumes as well as to continue to scale even beyond that into 2028 and beyond.

We work because of our local for local operating model and our really well built-out footprint, we've got good visibility to demand based on the combination of our conversations with customers on their expected volumes, combined with the visibility that our POR wins give us and we can typically invest in capacity inside. And so that modular capacity comes online within our existing footprints in different geographies, which allows us a very high return and a very efficient way to bring on incremental capacity to the market.

And then we take that one step further by working across our broader supply chain network to ensure both resiliency and flexibility of supply so that we don't create any disruptions anywhere across that value chain.

Operator

Our next question will come from Edward Yang with Oppenheimer.

Edward Yang

Jon, and welcome aboard, Ken. The first one would just be circling back to Jim's earlier question on gross margin, which was a very nice surprise. You were looking for some seasonal softness there from higher consumer electronics mix. So did that actually materialize in the quarter and you just outperformed through that?

And related to that, we're finally starting to see some genuine demand headwinds in non-AI and consumer devices. How is Qnity navigating that?

Jon Kemp

Yes. So I'll let Ken maybe take the first question on margins, and I'll take the second one on broader industry demand.

Ken Rizvi

Very good to meet virtually here. So if you look at the margin profile, you're spot on. In Q3, we did have excellent gross margins, 47.8% overall for the company. Some of that was really helped by the continued performance of the ST business, where those margins are in that 50%.

Range of then the continued improvement from ICS driven by product mix, where the margins are just over that 45% range as well.

What I would point to is really this progression that we made on a year-over-year basis. If you looked at the profile of the overall business, last year, we were in that 46% range. This year, we're trending in that 47% plus range here for 2026, quarter -- or sorry, year-to-date thus far. So we'll continue to make progress.

I think one of the focus areas that we have as a company as we head into 2027 is just making sure that we get the value for the innovations we continue to deliver to this ecosystem from the new products from the R&D investments from the capital investments we're making. So it will be a focus.

And as we've talked about maybe a couple of the questions that go is really over a period of time, how do we migrate this business to be north of 50%. So that will come over time, and it will be a focus of ours.

Jon Kemp

And Ed, great question. Maybe if I take a step back on the broader consumer electronics landscape, Obviously, some challenges more broadly in that market with some -- but most of those challenges are really focused on the low to mid-end of the market. We don't have a ton of exposure to that part of the market. Most of our content and exposure is really in premium devices, which has been much more resilient.

And on top of the more resilient demand performance, we've also got rising content wins in several of those premium devices. And so net-net, that's resulted in consumer electronics actually being a net positive to grow for the year.

Now it's not growing as fast as some of the other applications, but it's still a positive contributor for growth for the year. And we expect rising content and a little more resilient demand from the premium and to continue as we go forward.

The other thing I would say is, and this applies to sort of the margin profile in the third quarter as well is the AI-led demand across the broader end market mix. is more than offsetting any decline that we see from consumer electronics by a fairly wide margin.

So -- and I guess the key point is that wherever shifts and electronic content is going, whether that's data centers or smartphones or satellites, Qnity is well positioned to pick up that demand.

Edward Yang

Okay. That's great to hear. Just my follow-up would just be on CapEx. So you maintained your CapEx guide at $460 million, but year-to-date, you're underspending that by quite a bit, $290 million.

So are you likely to undershoot on CapEx? Or were there any constraints year-to-date on spending that you expect to ease in the fourth quarter to allow you to hit that CapEx target?

Ken Rizvi

Yes. So the target is still that $450 million to $470 million range. But this is really based on cash CapEx. So there's always some timing elements, the target the goal is still to spend that level here just based on the demand trends we're seeing out in '27 and beyond.

There may be some timing elements where some of that may move into Q1. But we'll evaluate as we move through the Q4 time frame. But I'll put it in your mind that it is still in that $4.50 to $4.70 range in terms of our target profile for [indiscernible].

Operator

Our next question comes from Melissa Weathers with Deutsche Bank.

Melissa Weathers

Ken, welcome to the call. I wanted to touch on a business you guys called out in the prepared remarks, the [ Kalrez ] side of things. Can you just remind us how big is that side of the business? And I know it's levered to like WFE and fab infrastructure kind of CapEx. So can you help walk us through what you're seeing in that business and how fast you continue about it growing?

Jon Kemp

Yes. Thanks, Melissa. Great question. It's kind of a hit gem inside our portfolio, and [ Kalrez ] is a great business. The way I would characterize it, it's maybe mid-teens within our semiconductor segment. The functionality, this is a seals business. So when you think about equipment that goes in the fab, a lot of that equipment, particularly for any of the process steps that are run under vacuum, which is primarily deposition and etch, the seal in order to ensure the integrity of the vacuum and that seating equipment often has to span the temperature range from cryogenic to plasma.

So you've got some extraordinarily challenging physical and environmental requirements and you've got to make sure that you don't have any contamination inside the chamber as well. And [ Kalrez ] is the market leader in terms of being able to provide the functionality that is necessary.

And then as you use that -- those vacuum chambers over time within the fab, those old rigs have to be replaced. That's why I call it a little bit of an equipment consumable business, because it's installed at the time that you put the equipment in, but then over time, there's a nice recurring revenue aftermarket portion of that business as well.

It's grown very nice this year. It's north of 20% growth. And with all of the -- and sort of attracted a combination [indiscernible] to wafer fab investment numbers, which are very healthy for the next couple of years here as well as a combination of what the actual wafer starts are inside of the fab which are also with rising utilization also create a nice favorable backdrop for that business.

So we're excited by the growth that we're seeing in the [ Kalrez ] business, and it continues to be a strong performer within our semi portfolio.

Meg Miller

Perfect. And then maybe one for Ken. I know you're early in the seats, but with the company having spun out a year ago, there's some start-up costs and public company costs, things like that. And your predecessors have put in some -- or talked about some programs to kind of reshape that spending profile over time.

So any like preview you can give us on how you're thinking about OpEx spending going forward? Any priorities and anything you might do the same or differently than the prior plan?

Ken Rizvi

Yes. So in terms of the transformation efforts that we've highlighted previously, those continue on. What you're seeing is us reinvest some of the benefits in terms of how we free up capacity on the manufacturing side. So we are reinvesting some of those benefits, but we are very much focused on the transformation efforts within the company in delivering those results, and those will be embedded into our P&L on a go-forward basis. We realize some of this already, as I mentioned, just from the capacity standpoint.

The other piece is around IT independents. And so that is a critical area for us. we actually had a significant milestone here just recently in Q4. Now we have north of 70% of our sales are now on unity stand-alone system. So that continues to make progress. The team the entire team within Qnity has done a fantastic job to make this happen here in Q4, and we'll continue that as we move through 2027 to be fully independent.

From a spending standpoint going forward. I'll go back to my earlier comments here, that as we think about the growth profile and where we are over a multiyear period, we're going to continue to invest in the business. So that's a portion of the CapEx and capital to support the customer ramps and road maps. But it's also on the R&D side and go-to-market side as well. We are a leader in innovation in the material space, and we want to continue to maintain that position.

As we highlighted before, and just from my perspective, having been around this ecosystem for 25 years and in different parts of the ecosystem when the time is so important to advancing technology in that Qnity, and we're sitting at the center of this innovation. So we're really excited about that opportunity. We'll provide more context as we move into our yearly guide for '27 next call.

Operator

Our next question comes from John Roberts with Mizuho.

John Ezekiel Roberts

Congrats on nice progress here and welcome, Ken. This may be a stupid question, but is liquid cooling penetrates data centers, does the attach of the cooling plate to the devices represent an opportunity for Qnity? Or is that too low tech and done away from your customers?

Ken Rizvi

Look, John, it's not a super question at all. It's a very good question because all of our customers are trying to figure out how to manage heat across the entire stack from the chip to the package to the broader system, and they're looking at any and all available technologies. Because heat is the ultimate performance killer in a device, right? So your question is a good one.

What I would say is really because the power of the next-gen compute that is going into many of these applications, it requires cooling kind of at every level. And so I think about a lot of these things as complementary technologies, not competing technologies. And if anything, there's increasing opportunities for more thermal content in every device. So you've seen us make a number of new product launches this year. That are kind of catered solutions across our thermal portfolio, whether that's at the chip package or device level with customers on how do we optimize thermal performance across the entire architecture of the system, including collaborating from both the polymeric thermal solutions as well as with mechanical and hearing sort of material based and mechanical-based solutions to help drive the thermal challenges.

And we think that trend, as we continue to drive more and more compute into these applications, the need to manage heat is not going away, and it will only require more and more opportunities for acuity content in these systems.

Operator

Thank you. That does conclude our question-and-answer session. Ladies and gentlemen, this brings us to the end of today's call and webcast. We appreciate your participation, and you may disconnect your line at any time, and have a wonderful day.