Trey, good question. I don't know how right it is, but here's my read:
The market is in the process of a transition to the next gen. I don't know exactly when it actually began in the fabs, but maybe some of the big Asian players coming out this past Winter and announcing they were shifting production capacity from 16's to 64's sort of signalled from a strategic POV "it's happening, and maybe sooner than expected". Somewhere out there, someone has to have published estimates for the general market for the 64's in the near-term. I just don't have the data.
My perception was that MU was a little behind the curve in terms of broadening out into 64's. Maybe this "sooner-than-expected transition" changes where they were relative to everyone else, but they're still a few quarters away (don't now how many) from having the 64's approach any critical mass in terms of earnings. I think Tom Kulack would agree that production this quarter will only be about 1-2 million, since that's what he wrote in his update <g>
MU's "competitive advantage" in the 64's is apparently a smaller die. I'm putting it in quotes because I'm still a babe in the woods when it comes to understanding production. A non-techie like me sort of wants to ask the question, "well, if smaller is better, and this is no great secret, what will/has prevented the competition from shrinking their die to similar sizes?"
And if the answer comes back "well, they just can't", I'm sort of inclined to ask "well, why?"
Don't know.
Good trading,
Tom |
