Winbond to exit commodity DRAM business.
Winbond's Q4 sales jump 16% over Q3 as company changes DRAM strategy
Semiconductor Business News
(02/05/02 12:57 p.m. EST)
HSINCHU, Taiwan -- Taiwan's Winbond Electronic Corp. here reported sales of $169 million (NT$5.7 billion) for its fourth quarter ended Dec. 31, a 16% jump over the previous quarter but down 49% from the like period a year ago.
The chip maker also posted a loss of $121 million (NT$4.1 billion) for the quarter, compared to a profit of $214 million (NT$748 billion) a year ago.
For the year, Winbond reported sales of $691.7 million (NT$24.1 billion), a 51% drop from 2000. It also posted a loss of $305 million (NT$10.7 billion) for 2001.
The company blamed the results on the downturn of the semiconductor business, especially DRAMs. For years, Winbond has made DRAMs on a foundry basis for Japan's Toshiba Corp.
While Winbond's DRAM business fell into the red in 2001, the company also lost its technology partner as Toshiba exited from the commodity memory market.
"With respect to memory products, Winbond will pursue the strategy it has been working for since last year," the company said. "Over the next three years, the Company plans to gradually move away from focusing on standard DRAM and switch its main memory product focus to flash memory and niche DRAM products," the company said.
The company will focus more on logic chips. "The company's Logic Product Business group will concentrate on more competitive markets such as motherboards, LCD driver ICs, smart I/O ICs, wireless communications and consumer IC products," according to the company.
siliconstrategies.com |
