LRCX's ALD Moly Adoption Ramps Up: Will it be a Key Growth Driver?

Lam Research LRCX is growing its position in molybdenum (moly) deposition, a technology that could increase its share of the chip equipment market. Lam Research is currently the only supplier with atomic layer deposition (ALD) molybdenum tools already in production for foundry, logic and NAND customers.

Moly is gaining importance as the industry moves below the 2nm node. Below the 2nm nodes, gate-all-around structures face resistance-capacitance (RC) issues with traditional tungsten films. Moly offers lower resistance, and replacing it with tungsten solves this issue. While moly deposition is slower and more complex, it can triple Lam Research’s served available market (SAM) for metal deposition per wafer at these advanced nodes.

In NAND, Lam Research’s Halo ALD Moly tools are ramping at multiple NAND customers, with adoption expected to grow as manufacturers move to NAND capacity of more than 200-plus layers. Moreover, in foundry and logic, moly is being used to improve transistor performance for AI-driven designs.

In the fourth quarter of fiscal 2025, Lam Research secured a key win from another leading foundry for a next-generation application. Lam Research’s multi-station architecture is capable of both plasma and thermal processing in the same chamber, which allows customers to optimize for different applications of future logic devices.

Moly adoption is one of several drivers, along with advanced packaging, high-bandwidth memory, and NAND layer scaling, that Lam Research expects will expand SAM to the high-30% range of wafer fabrication equipment in the coming years. If execution holds, Lam Research’s early lead in ALD moly could help it gain share in NAND, foundry and logic, reinforcing its position in next-generation device manufacturing.

How Competitors Fare Against Lam Research

Semiconductor heavyweights like Applied Materials AMAT and ASML Holding ASML are also seeing strong momentum as memory makers invest in next-generation technologies.

Applied Materials is experiencing an increase in NAND investment from the very low levels seen in recent years and projected revenue growth in NAND for fiscal 2025, driven by customer upgrades. During second-quarter fiscal 2025 results, Applied Materials projected that revenues from its advanced DRAM customers would grow more than 40% in fiscal 2025. Applied Materials expects this demand to be driven by increased investments in DDR5 and high-bandwidth memory. 

In the second quarter of 2025, ASML Holding stated that 31% of its net system sales came from memory. Moreover, ASML Holding highlighted strong customer demand for its products. The demand was driven by ASML’s DRAM and logic customers, which are ramping leading-edge nodes using ASML’s NXE:3800E EUV systems.

LRCX's Price Performance, Valuation & Estimates

Shares of Lam Research have gained 41.9% year to date compared with the Zacks Electronics – Semiconductors industry’s growth of 19.7%.

LRCX YTD Price Return Performance

From a valuation standpoint, its forward price-to-earnings ratio of 23.03 is significantly below the industry’s average of 34.32.

LRCX Forward 12-Month P/E Ratio

The Zacks Consensus Estimate for Lam Research’s fiscal 2026 earnings has been revised upward to $4.38 per share over the past 30 days. The estimated earnings figure for fiscal 2026 represents year-over-year growth of 5.8%.  

Lam Research currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.

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This article originally published on Zacks Investment Research (zacks.com).

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