Semtech Reports After Tuesday's Close Against Its Own $328.0 Million Guide, With the Compal Sale Still Unclosed

by Karl Lindström · August 25, 2026

Semiconductors & Hardware Reporter, Frontier Tech Wire

Semtech is scheduled to publish results for the second quarter of its fiscal 2027 year after the close of trading on Tuesday, August 25, with a conference call at 1:30 p.m. Pacific time, or 4:30 p.m. Eastern. The company set that date in an announcement issued on August 11. Nothing in this article describes the quarter's outcome, because the quarter's outcome has not been published.

What is on the record is the guidance Semtech itself issued three months ago. In its first-quarter release, dated May 26, 2026, the company guided to second-quarter net sales of $328.0 million, plus or minus $5.0 million. It also guided to an adjusted gross margin of 54.0 percent within 50 basis points, an adjusted operating margin of 21.9 percent within 40 basis points, and adjusted diluted earnings per share of $0.61 within two cents.

The distinction matters. The sales figure is a revenue guide. The margin and earnings figures are all non-GAAP, adjusted measures, and Semtech's own first quarter showed how wide that gap can be. For the quarter ended April 26, 2026, the company reported GAAP net sales of $291.0 million, up 6 percent sequentially and 16 percent year on year, a GAAP gross margin of 52.0 percent, and GAAP diluted earnings per share of $0.27, up 23 percent year on year. On an adjusted basis, the same quarter produced a gross margin of 53.0 percent, an operating margin of 20.4 percent and diluted earnings per share of $0.51, up 34 percent year on year.

In other words, adjusted earnings per share in the first quarter were nearly double the GAAP figure. Any comparison of Tuesday's result to the $0.61 guide has to be made against the adjusted line, and a reader who compares the guide to a GAAP number will reach the wrong conclusion in the wrong direction.

Hong Hou, Semtech's chief executive, said in the May release that "Semtech is off to an exceptional start in fiscal year 2027, delivering record quarterly results and expanding design wins across our data center and LoRa businesses." Chief financial officer Mark Lin, in the same release, tied the improved second-quarter outlook to what he described as strong operational fundamentals.

Since that guidance was issued, the shape of the company has changed on paper. On August 13, Semtech filed an 8-K disclosing a definitive agreement to sell its cellular module business to Compal Electronics of Taiwan for $62 million in cash, subject to customary adjustments. The filing describes the sale as covering substantially all of the assets and operations comprising the cellular module business, including its associated intellectual property, customer relationships and personnel.

That transaction has not closed. Semtech's filing puts the expected completion in the fourth quarter of its fiscal 2027 year and conditions it on satisfaction or waiver of customary closing conditions, including receipt of certain regulatory approvals. Tuesday's report therefore covers a period in which the cellular module business was still part of the company.

The filing also does not disclose the revenue or profitability of the business being sold. That absence is the single most useful thing to watch for in the release and on the call. Without a stated contribution from the divested unit, outside observers cannot yet model what Semtech looks like once the sale completes, and any attempt to do so before the company provides the figure is guesswork.

The backdrop is a chip tape that has been weak. Monday, August 24, was the last completed session. The Nasdaq composite closed at 25,980.19, down 200.26 points or 0.8 percent, and the Russell 2000 closed at 2,995.08, down 22.79 points or 0.8 percent, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 140.15 points to 53,417.16, according to Associated Press data carried by Barchart. The S&P 500 finished at 7,652.86, down 21.51 points. A market close report published by Econcurrents called tech "the weak spot, as it has been on recent down days, with Micron and Marvell falling sharply."

Semtech's report also lands the day before the largest scheduled event in the sector. Nvidia said on July 29 that it will hold its conference call for second-quarter fiscal 2027 results, covering the quarter ended July 26, 2026, on Wednesday, August 26, at 2 p.m. Pacific time and 5 p.m. Eastern. This article deliberately cites no consensus estimate for that quarter. Different data providers compile consensus differently and publish different numbers, and readers will see figures elsewhere that do not match one another for that reason alone.

Federal Reserve chair Kevin Warsh is scheduled to deliver the keynote on Friday, August 28, during the Kansas City Fed's Jackson Hole symposium, which runs August 27 to 29. Both that speech and the Nvidia report are in the future at the time of writing, and neither can be characterised here. What can be said about Tuesday is narrow and specific: Semtech has told the market it expects $328.0 million in net sales, give or take $5.0 million, and the market will find out after the close whether it got there.