Please correct me if I am wrong, but the laser correction for 16 meg chips need to be upgraded to work on 64M DRAM? Have you heard anything about get ting any wins that aren't DRAM oriented?
Japanese cutting back on 16-Mbit
Electronic Buyers News, Friday, January 23, 1998 at 22:46
by Jack Robertson
Seoul, South Korea- Profit pressure attributable to the plunge in DRAM
prices is prompting Hitachi Ltd., NEC Corp., and Toshiba Corp. to cut
production sharply again on money-losing 16-Mbit chips.
The three Japanese companies are rapidly doubling the output of
64-Mbit DRAMs, which are now also losing money but are expected to
become profitable as demand picks up and yields increase
significantly.
A spokesman at Hitachi in Tokyo said last week that 16-Mbit production
will be cut 20% in the next two months, to 8 million units monthly. The
cutback affects Hitachi's Japanese fabs only, which will stop lines for
up to a week in February and March.
Hitachi also plans to cut production of SRAM and ROM chips at its
Japanese fabs, the spokesman said.
He blamed the unprofitable 16-Mbit market for the reductions. Although
declining to comment on Japanese press reports that Hitachi would
report a loss for its fiscal year ending March 31, he said "it is a
very, very serious situation."
A Toshiba official in Tokyo last week forecast that the company will
see net profit drop 85% to only $76 million for the fiscal year ending
March 31. Toshiba's net earnings for the previous year were 125 billion
yen, equivalent to $1.25 billion at the year-ago exchange rate or $900
million today.
As a result, Toshiba is delaying construction of a fab in Kyushu,
Japan. Construction, which was originally to begin this year, may be
delayed until 2000, and production may not start until 2002.
NEC will scale back unprofitable 16-Mbit output by starting next month
to shift all 16-Mbit production from its United Kingdom and Japanese
fabs to Roseville, Calif. Fabs in the United Kingdom and in Hiroshima
and Kyushu, Japan, will produce only 64-Mbit DRAMs on a 0.25-micron
process, a spokeswoman said.
In the shift, NEC expects to ramp up total 64-Mbit production from the
current level of 3 million units per month to 6 million per month this
summer. The spokeswoman said all 64-Mbit parts will be made on
0.25-micron lines, which are expected to yield up to 400 die from an
8-in. wafer. NEC is also cutting its earnings expectations.
Analysts believe 400 die per 8-in. wafer is the minimum level needed
to be profitable at the $13 to $16 range for the next-generation memory
chip.
Fujitsu Ltd. plans by midyear to cut its 16-Mbit production rate in
half from the current level of 7 million units per month, a spokesman
said. At the same time, the company hopes to ramp up 64-Mbit DRAMs to 3
million units per month this year. |
