Rocky, we agree about a lot more than we disagree about. The market share picture that I see is very similar to the one you describe. That is, AMAT is winning most of the tool selection competitions that have happened in the last 6 months or so. I agree with your assessment that AMAT will probably win most of the tool orders placed in 1999.
Where we differ is in our assessments of the reasons for AMAT's strength at the expense of SFAM.
I contend that SpeedFam's strengths are the following:
--superior throughput
--superior cost of ownership
--process capability sufficient for most ILD oxide, tungsten plug, poly, and traditional STI polishing
--well-characterized and adequate reliability
--lots of manufacturing capacity
--good scrubber integration
SpeedFam's weaknesses are the following:
--limited demonstrated ability to polish and clean copper in the most difficult applications
--no 300 mm tool released
AMAT's strengths are the following:
--excellent marketing and leveraging of dominance in other segments of semiconductor equipment industry
--superior endpoint
--superior polishing head
--process flexibility to support multiple-slurry copper polishing strategies
--300 mm tool is further along
--lots of manufacturing capacity
--lots of bodies in field support, though they have very limited polish experience and have a high mean time to repair
--global reach of field support, marketing, spare parts, etc., is second to none
AMAT's weaknesses are the following:
--high cost of ownership
--Titan head and endpoint, though superior to SFAM's, do not live up to the promises and hype
--more immature platform with associated reliability issues
--crummy scrubber integration
I think that you would agree with most of these points. Your comment that "The Auriga is not superior for anything if you look at the order rate in the industry right now" simplifies things a bit, so I can't tell for sure.
Regarding copper, you state that
<<SFAM has no tool. Not because of flexibility but because the tool plain doesn't work. IPEC's is the most competitive on copper next to the AMAT and Lam tool. >>
I am certain that the Auriga-C has the capability to polish copper, though you're right that they haven't won (to my knowledge) any volume orders for copper applications. I stand by my statement that the additional platens on the Mirra compared to the Auriga-C is a key reason for some of the head-to-head results. As the consumables for copper mature, this advantage will diminish as some companies attempt to get comparable process results, lower cost, and higher throughput by getting by with a single step copper/barrier metal polish.
That's all I have time for now.
Best wishes and profitable investing,
Mr. Sam
(For full disclosure, I have 8% of my money in SFAM stock and 3% in AMAT stock.) |
