The AI server manufacturer SUPER MICRO COMPUTER INC (Supermicro) disclosed on Tuesday that it secured over $60 billion in new orders for the fiscal quarter ending in June, leading to a 17% surge in its pre-market share price. The company, a key manufacturing partner for Nvidia servers, released this preliminary update ahead of its official earnings report scheduled for August 11th. It also indicated that gross margin performance for the quarter would be better than previously forecasted, projected to be in the range of 15% to 17%, nearly double the prior estimate.
Several factors have contributed to a significant decline in Supermicro's stock price from its 2024 peak: the company's substantial capital outlay for procuring hardware components, share sales to fund these purchases, and an ongoing regulatory investigation following the arrest of an employee for allegedly violating U.S. export controls by shipping servers containing Nvidia chips to China.
Supermicro stated that this new backlog of orders will be fulfilled over several future fiscal quarters, with customer payments not being received all at once. The company estimates that revenue for the June quarter will be near the lower end of its previously provided guidance range of $11 billion to $12.5 billion. Despite this, the figure still underscores the robust demand in the AI server market. Over the past 12 months ending in March, Supermicro's total revenue reached $34 billion.
While Supermicro did not disclose the specific client for this large order, its long-term partner SpaceX's AI division is widely considered a significant source. In June, CEO Charles Liang posted on the X platform that Supermicro was supplying components for SpaceX AI's large-scale AI data center project. Multiple informed sources have indicated that SpaceX AI is procuring billions of dollars worth of Nvidia's top-tier server racks from both Supermicro and Dell.
Supermicro's standard financial reporting does not typically disclose its backlog figures. In March of this year, the company reported $2 billion in remaining performance obligations—legally binding agreements for which the company expects to receive payment over time—with the vast majority of these funds expected to be collected within approximately the next year.