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Technology Stocks : Mattson Technology
MTSN 3.6000.0%May 12 5:00 PM EST
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To: Curlton Latts who wrote (2473)1/18/2000 1:58:00 PM
From: Ian@SI  Read Replies (1) of 3661
 
Curly,

Sorry for the delayed response. My PC froze, then I got on the phone for a while.

Is there anything (other than a time lead) that would prevent AMAT from catching up and being an aggressive competitor.

Once a company has its tools established as the Production Tool of Record in a Fab, it's almost impossible to displace it until the next generation of chips which require new process tools. i.e. - the repeat business will come unless the winner does some very stupid things along the way.

Any other aggressive competitors?

Oh Yes. Several. Key one in the world is AMAT. Others include NVLS and TEL (Tokyo Electron) for CVD. I don't know all the RTP players, but AMAT is key, SVGI is another and there are probably several others.

Strip leader until last quarter was GSNX. The Strip leader is now MTSN; and it looks like the Street is now acknowledging that fact. Fusion also is a Strip supplier.

What are the barriers to entry, if any?


Lots. Anything from relationships to costs to quality to service to productivity to ...

These tools are increasingly complex working at increasingly infinitessimal geometries where immeasurable impurities can spoil an entire batch of wafers before the problem is notices. Personally, I doubt that we see a large number of successful new competitors.

Rather I'd expect consolidation to speed up. It's usually much cheaper to buy a proven technology than to attempt to develop it from scratch.

Best,
Ian.
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