Aehr Test Systems is a niche maker of test and burn-in equipment that has spent three years inside a semiconductor downturn and emerged at the start of fiscal 2027 with a bet it has not had to make good on yet: that artificial-intelligence processors, silicon photonics, and electric-vehicle power chips are about to turn its burn-in process from a cost center into a mandatory production step. There are two ways to read the fiscal 2026 annual report. The first reads as continued decay: revenue fell for a third straight year to $50.0 million, down 15% from the prior year's $59.0 million, GAAP gross margin compressed to 35.3%, and the GAAP net loss widened to $0.23 per diluted share from $0.13. Cash flow from operations was negative for the year. The second reading is the one the market has already adopted: the fiscal fourth quarter produced record bookings of $60.7 million and an effective backlog of $100.6 million, and management guided fiscal 2027 revenue to $130 million to $150 million - roughly 160% to 200% growth - at a non-GAAP net income margin of 18% to 22%.
The two readings are converging on one question: does the backlog hold, and does the demand behind it arrive? The company finished the year with $116.5 million of cash and no debt after raising roughly $100 million through an at-the-market equity program, funding a balance sheet transformation to support the ramp. The stock has already paid for a large slice of the good news. At $117.18 as of August 11, 2026, Aehr trades up more than sevenfold from its 52-week low of $16.38, at roughly 27x forward sales and somewhere above 120x forward non-GAAP earnings against the guided fiscal 2027. The fourth quarter was the evidence that the inflection is real. The multiple is the price being paid for it. This report walks the ledgers, the backlog, the margin math, and the set of thresholds that would confirm or break the case.