Tokai Carbon Korea

TCK is a materials company making consumable parts for semiconductor etch and diffusion processes, established in 1996 as a 50:50 joint venture between Japan's Tokai Carbon and Korea's KC Tech.

Its business splits into CVD-based Solid SiC components (SiC rings, dummy wafers, shower heads), graphite components, and SiC/TaC coated susceptors. Of these, the Solid SiC segment accounted for roughly 90% of total revenue on a standalone basis in the first half of 2026 (company profile data, 2026).

The flagship SiC focus ring is a doughnut-shaped part that surrounds the wafer edge in etch chambers, helping distribute plasma evenly and protecting the wafer rim; it wears down continuously under high-temperature, high-plasma conditions, so replacement demand recurs as long as production continues.

Sales flow through the so-called before-market, meaning parts reach end users via equipment makers, with Lam Research, Tokyo Electron, SEMES and China's AMEC cited as core customers.

By contrast, Hana Materials and KNJ operate in the after-market, shipping directly to chipmakers, and the SiC focus ring makers have all been adding capacity. The company states it was the first in Korea to build an integrated line covering machining, purification and CVD SiC coating.

On the intellectual property front, it won a patent infringement and damages suit as well as an invalidation case against YMC and WYCOM, which management framed as meaningful for protecting its technology. TaC coated susceptors serve the SiC epitaxy process used for electric-vehicle power semiconductors.

Earnings peaked in 2022 at revenue of KRW 319.56bn and operating profit of KRW 127.03bn (39.8% margin), then fell sharply in 2023 to KRW 226.65bn and KRW 66.70bn, before recovering for two straight years to KRW 275.72bn and KRW 80.75bn in 2024 and KRW 301.33bn and KRW 83.89bn in 2025.

Even in 2025, when revenue exceeded the 2022 level, operating profit of KRW 83.89bn stood at only about two-thirds of the 2022 figure, and margin drifted down from 29.4% in 2023 to 29.3% in 2024 and 27.8% in 2025.

Net profit attributable to owners slipped from KRW 71.99bn in 2024 to KRW 69.90bn in 2025, so revenue growth did not translate directly into bottom-line growth.

Quarterly, revenue and operating profit improved from KRW 72.67bn and KRW 19.50bn in Q2 2025 to KRW 79.24bn and KRW 22.38bn in Q3 2025, before easing to KRW 71.06bn and KRW 18.53bn (26.1% margin) in Q4 2025.

Kiwoom Securities, in a January 2026 report, attributed that Q4 softness to year-end inventory adjustments by customers and one-off costs including special year-end bonuses.

Q1 2026 then set a quarterly high at revenue of KRW 95.39bn and operating profit of KRW 28.55bn (29.9%), followed by KRW 94.87bn and KRW 26.85bn (28.3%) in Q2 2026.

For the first half, revenue of KRW 190.26bn and operating profit of KRW 55.40bn were reported as up 26.0% and 28.9% year on year based on regulatory filings, while both edged down versus the prior quarter.

Management said core SiC revenue did not decline and that the sequential dip came from the graphite segment, which swings widely quarter to quarter.

The balance sheet is light, with year-end 2025 equity of KRW 519.3bn against liabilities of KRW 48.31bn for a 9.3% debt-to-equity ratio, but operating cash flow of KRW 20.98bn in 2023, KRW 74.42bn in 2024 and KRW 54.11bn in 2025 has fluctuated far more than profit, so working capital and capex flows warrant attention.

The downstream NAND market entered a shortage and sharp price-increase phase in 2026, driven by AI servers and enterprise SSDs for data centers.

TrendForce estimated Q1 2026 NAND contract prices rose 85-90% quarter on quarter and projected a further 70-75% gain in Q2, while Counterpoint Research calculated that Q2 2026 NAND market revenue grew 70% sequentially.

That said, TrendForce also stated the shortage should last into the second half of 2026 before supply and demand return to normal levels next year, so views on where the cycle stands diverge.

TCK's demand tracks production and investment volumes and process difficulty more than pricing, and IBK Investment & Securities noted in its September 3, 2026 report that NAND has entered a transition from 8th-generation 236 layers to 9th-generation 286 layers, with a 1,000-layer roadmap laid out longer term.

Etch is the front-end step where process intensity has risen most, shortening part replacement cycles and lifting adoption of SiC, which offers stronger plasma resistance than quartz or silicon.

On competition, after-market suppliers' entry into SiC rings previously eroded the company's share, a factor also cited in the 2023 revenue decline. Conversely, IBK described TCK in the same report as the global No.1 SiC focus ring maker, with supply contracts to Chinese equipment firms expanding since AMEC.

Overall, structural demand from NAND layer growth and offsetting forces from competitor entry and eventual supply normalization are operating at the same time.

The most concrete leading indicator is the order backlog. IBK Investment & Securities said in its September 3, 2026 report that TCK's SiC backlog jumped 115% in a single quarter, from KRW 81.9bn in Q1 2026 to KRW 176.3bn in Q2.

On capacity, Yuanta Securities Korea said in a March 2026 report that it expects the company to complete the purchase of a new Anseong site in the first half and begin ordering key equipment, and that with the new site at least 30-40% larger than the existing one, medium-term annual revenue capacity including the new plant could approach KRW 1trn with operating profit capability near KRW 300bn.

On products, Kiwoom Securities said in a January 2026 report that 9th-generation NAND uses more SiC in production, which should support earnings.

For new applications, IBK noted that as HBM stacks grow taller, through-silicon-via etch difficulty intensifies and focus ring material could shift from quartz to SiC, with discussion that the addressable market may extend into HBM from HBM4 onward.

On customers, the same report argued that growth in China's semiconductor market could broaden TCK's customer base.

Meanwhile, the graphite segment swings widely by quarter on management's own account and remains a source of top-line volatility, and the company is reported to be running research on new plasma-resistant materials, SiC single-crystal wafers and battery anode materials.

Publicly verifiable company-issued annual numeric guidance is limited, so expansion filings and quarterly backlog and segment revenue serve as the practical checkpoints.