Rubicon Technology, Inc. (NASDAQ:RBCN), a provider of sapphire substrates and products to the LED, RFIC, Semiconductor, and Optical industries, today reported financial results for its first quarter ended March 31, 2009.

The Company reported revenue of $2.3 million, a net loss of $3.9 million, and a $0.19 diluted loss per share for the first quarter. These financial results were within the Company's previously disclosed guidance range. The quarter was heavily affected by the slowdown in consumer spending, particularly in consumer electronics, where much of Rubicon's products are currently used.

Raja Parvez, President and CEO noted, "While it was a difficult quarter, we are beginning to see improvement in the LED market driven by an accelerated rate of adoption of LED backlighting for products using LCD display panels, such as notebook and netbook computers and now LCD TVs. Industry estimates are that the penetration rate of LED-backlit notebooks and netbooks may now reach as high as 70 to 80 percent by the end of this year compared to earlier estimates of only 30%. In addition, several large consumer electronics manufacturers are aggressively bringing to market large screen LED-backlit LCD TVs."

For the quarter, capital expenditures were approximately $500 thousand and total cash used (excluding amounts used for the share repurchase program) was $2.9 million. At the end of the quarter, the Company had $52 million in cash and investments with no debt.

"We managed expenses aggressively in the quarter and are focused on maintaining a strong balance sheet," said William Weissman, Rubicon's Chief Financial Officer. "Taking advantage of Rubicon's share price, we repurchased $2.6 million of our common stock in the quarter. Since the program was approved in November 2008, we have repurchased approximately 1.25 million shares at an average cost of $4.53 per share," he added.

Second Quarter 2009 Outlook
Commenting on the 2009 outlook, Mr. Weissman continued, "While we are encouraged by the recent activity in the LED market, we believe it will take the rest of this quarter for customers to work down their inventories of sapphire. As a result, we expect second quarter results to be in line with the first quarter. We do expect orders to pick up in Q3, however, given that we still have limited visibility we are not able to provide specific guidance on the remainder of the year at this time."

About Rubicon Technology, Inc.
Rubicon Technology, Inc. is an electronic materials provider that is engaged in developing, manufacturing and selling monocrystalline sapphire and other crystalline products for light-emitting diodes (LEDs), radio frequency integrated circuits (RFICs), blue laser diodes, optoelectronics and other optical applications. The Company applies its proprietary crystal growth technology to produce very high-quality sapphire in a form that allows for volume production of various sizes and orientations of substrates and windows. Rubicon is a vertically-integrated manufacturer with capabilities in crystal growth, high precision core drilling, wafer slicing, surface lapping, large-diameter polishing and wafer cleaning processes, which the Company employs to convert the bulk crystal into products with the quality and precision specified by its customers. The Company is actively developing larger diameter products to support next-generation LED, RFIC and optical window applications.