TOKYO -- Operating profit at Disco, a Japanese maker of semiconductor production machinery, likely soared 90% on the year to around 40 billion yen ($361 million) for the nine months through December, topping the 36.6 billion yen projection as brisk demand for chips spurred orders for the company's sawing and polishing equipment.
This marks a record profit for an April-December period, surpassing the previous high reached two years earlier. Sales apparently rose a little over 30% to about 126.5 billion yen.
