Question-and-Answer Session
Operator
(Operator instructions) The first question comes from the line of Parag Agarwal – UBS.
Parag Agarwal – UBS
On your guidance you indicated that you were booked about 90% at the beginning of the quarter. Can you give some color on the booking trends since the beginning of the quarter so far?
Keith Jackson
The booking trends have been very strong. We continue to see our customers requesting things pulled in. I would anticipate no troubles with getting the turns for the quarter.
Parag Agarwal – UBS
Also can you comment about the lead times how they are stretching? Have you been able to meet all the demand or have you been capitally constrained at all?
Keith Jackson
Our lead times have been stretched out approximately 11 weeks for this quarter versus 9 in the previous quarters. They have stretched. No, our customers are requesting more than we can deliver this quarter.
Parag Agarwal – UBS
Looking at the general environment what is your view of the demand beyond Q4 in the sense of what your customers are telling you as we head into 2010, especially about industrial and auto sectors.
Keith Jackson
We are getting a picture from our customers their demand continues to strengthen. They are more bullish about the first quarter than we have seen in many years. So I guess I would say it is a very positive outlook by the customers. They are backing that up with orders in advance of that so right now I would have to say it is a fairly positive environment.
Automotive, I do believe specifically will do some tapering off because the incentive programs are over and they will catch up with their inventory build sometime early next year.
Operator
The next question comes from the line of James Schneider – Goldman Sachs.
James Schneider – Goldman Sachs
To put the previous question a bit differently how should we think about Q1 seasonality and the concept of that? Clearly you have done a couple of acquisitions, most notably AMI, which has different seasonality than the historical business. How should we think about Q1 being stronger or weaker than normal and what is normal?
Keith Jackson
Normal has been roughly down 3-8 or approximately 5% sequentially. If you look at the last 10 years or so that would be normal. Clearly our customers are indicating to us, as I mentioned earlier, a more positive attitude than we normally would see but I can’t give any guidance beyond Q4 right now. We will frankly have to wait to the end of the quarter to know the story. Right now at least the customers are appearing a little more positive than they have in the past at this time of year.
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