Joe, you are one IDTI shareholder around here that isn't in denial.
I think the supply line for semiconductors is overloaded (Whittington's
freight train analogy) for DRAM and SRAM, but not for microprocessors,
looking at the big hitters. I'm afraid he may be right with regard to RAMs. When's it get back
in balance with demand? Just guessing 2 to 3 years. Before the dark horse
jockey flames start, there is precedence and it happened with the same
products. Just that the American companies that got hurt were Intel,
who went back to safer CPU ground; TI (TXN) who were very broad based
and survived on their other products; Mostek who is no longer around.
This was just about 10 years ago, maybe 12.
When it's said a company has to be deiversified to be safe in a chip
war, they mean really diversified. I don't think that is true with IDT
and the other 3 dwarfs mentioned a lot here (ISSI, ALSC, CY). If they
have 40% of their market in SRAM, and that's under siege, look out. The other
60 in CISC CPU, etc., isn't going to carry them through the war.
Again, the Asian competition was Fujitsu, Hitachi, Toshiba and they are
doing the same thing again. BTW, it's not just price chopping. The
3 Japanese companies mentioned also have the most reliable SRAMs.
Not good news for companies like IDT, but, you asked for my opinion.
Much safer ground would be INTC, LSI for semiconductors; HP for computers.
IBM, I suppose, but I don't care for companies who make a turnaround by
laying off 50, 60 thousands of people. Guess I shouldn't care, make it a
business decision.
I don't want to be the IDT bear, but...
Liz |
