Earnings results often indicate what direction a company will take in the months ahead. With Q4 now behind us, let’s have a look at FormFactor (NASDAQ:FORM) and its peers.

The semiconductor industry is driven by demand for advanced electronic products like smartphones, PCs, servers, and data storage. The need for technologies like artificial intelligence, 5G networks, and smart cars is also creating the next wave of growth for the industry. Keeping up with this dynamism requires new tools that can design, fabricate, and test chips at ever smaller sizes and more complex architectures, creating a dire need for semiconductor capital manufacturing equipment.

The 14 semiconductor manufacturing stocks we track reported a mixed Q4; on average, revenues beat analyst consensus estimates by 2.4%. while next quarter's revenue guidance was 5.6% below consensus. Investors abandoned cash-burning companies to buy stocks with higher margins of safety, but semiconductor manufacturing stocks held their ground better than others, with the share prices up 7.3% on average since the previous earnings results.

FormFactor (NASDAQ:FORM)

With customers across the foundry and fabless markets, FormFactor (NASDAQ:FORM) is a US-based provider of test and measurement technologies for semiconductors.

FormFactor reported revenues of $168.2 million, up 1.3% year on year, topping analyst expectations by 1.7%. It was a decent quarter for the company, with a significant improvement in its gross margin but underwhelming revenue guidance for the next quarter.

“Compared to the outlook, FormFactor delivered moderately higher fourth quarter revenue and gross margins offset by a higher tax rate that produce non-GAAP EPS at mid-point of the outlook,” said Mike Slessor, CEO of FormFactor,

The stock is up 21.5% since the results and currently trades at $46.29.

Is now the time to buy FormFactor? Access our full analysis of the earnings results here, it's free.

Best Q4: Nova (NASDAQ:NVMI)

Headquartered in Israel, Nova (NASDAQ: NVMI) is a provider of quality control systems used in semiconductor manufacturing.

Nova reported revenues of $134.2 million, down 11.3% year on year, outperforming analyst expectations by 4.8%. It was a very strong quarter for the company, with an impressive beat of analysts' EPS estimates and a significant improvement in its inventory levels.

The stock is up 14.5% since the results and currently trades at $180.35.

Is now the time to buy Nova? Access our full analysis of the earnings results here, it's free.

Weakest Q4: Kulicke and Soffa (NASDAQ:KLIC)

Headquartered in Singapore, Kulicke & Soffa (NASDAQ: KLIC) is a provider of production equipment and tools used to assemble semiconductor devices

Kulicke and Soffa reported revenues of $171.2 million, down 2.9% year on year, falling short of analyst expectations by 0.5%. It was a weak quarter for the company, with underwhelming revenue guidance for the next quarter and a decline in its operating margin.

The stock is down 4.4% since the results and currently trades at $48.05.

Read our full analysis of Kulicke and Soffa's results here.

Marvell Technology (NASDAQ:MRVL)

Moving away from a low margin storage device management chips in one of the biggest semiconductor business model pivots of the past decade, Marvell Technology (NASDAQ: MRVL) is a fabless designer of special purpose data processing and networking chips used by data centers, communications carriers, enterprises, and autos.

Marvell Technology reported revenues of $1.43 billion, flat year on year, in line with analyst expectations. It was a weak quarter for the company, with underwhelming revenue guidance for the next quarter and a miss of analysts' EPS estimates.

The stock is down 14.6% since the results and currently trades at $72.5.

Read our full, actionable report on Marvell Technology here, it's free.

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