QuickLogic Shares Zoom 616% In 4 Years: Could This Chipmaker Be On A Nvidia-Style Trajectory? (CORRECTED)

This story has been corrected to make clear that QuickLogic is profitable.

QuickLogic Corporation (NASDAQ:QUIK) is a rare example of a semiconductor stock that is not even close to its record highs.

Those were hit more than a decade ago, but analysts are warming to the stock.

Just this week, the company unveiled a couple of important contract wins leveraging its expertise in field-programmable gate array (FPGA) circuits.

FPGAs can be programmed of reconfigured after production to perform specific functions, unlike more traditional application-specific integrated circuits (ASIC), designed for a single purpose.

Like many of its rivals, such as Nvidia Corporation (NASDAQ:NVDA) and Advanced Micro Devices Inc. (NASDAQ:AMD), QuickLogic is a fabless designer and developer of chips, that outsources their manufacture to foundries, such as those operated by GlobalFoundries Inc. (NASDAQ:GFS) or Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing (NASDAQ:TSM).

Record Highs A Decade Back

QuickLogic’s record highs were hit in early 2010s during the first chip explosion as demand for smartphones first started to peak. Its shares then experienced a sharp decline and several years of trading sideways, until it refocused on intellectual property (IP) in system-on-chip (SoC) design.

Since 2020, the shares have broadly been on the up. From their 2020 low to their current six-year high, the shares have climbed 616%.

“That’s really not even the most exciting part about the stock,” said David Bartosiak, stock strategist at
Zacks Investment Research.

“It’s all about the growth numbers. Looking at the earnings side of the equation, QuickLogic is set to enter an era of profitability this year, with profits multiplying next.”

The company’s stand-out model, as an expected explosion of artificial intelligence-driven demand hits the semiconductor sector, is its Austalis Platform.