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Politics : Formerly About Applied Materials -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Sonki who wrote (31125)	6/23/1999 10:53:00 AM
From: Jeffrey D	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 70976

NEC and Hitachi will do joint venture to cut chip costs. Jeff << Tokyo, June 23 (Bloomberg) -- NEC Corp., Japan's largest microchip-maker, and Hitachi Ltd. said they plan to set up a joint venture by the end of the year to cut the cost of developing and making future generations of computer memory chips. Hitachi, Japan's No. 3 chipmaker, and NEC may also unify their production of dynamic random-access memory chips -- the chips most commonly used as main memory in PCs -- under a single brand, said NEC President Koji Nishigaki and Hitachi President Etsuhiko Shoyama at a press conference. Average prices of DRAM chips crashed by about two thirds in the year ended March 31 thanks to global oversupply, contributing heavily to record losses at NEC and Hitachi for the year. ''Reforming our DRAM business is part of our road to global survival,'' said NEC's Nishigaki. ''We've had huge losses on DRAMs, and the threat of falling DRAM prices is the biggest risk factor for us.'' NEC and Hitachi gave no other details. Their announcement follows a similar agreement in December between Toshiba Corp., Japan's second-largest chipmaker, and Fujitsu Ltd., the nation's fourth largest. Average prices of the most commonly used memory chips, 64- megabit DRAMs, have plunged to about $5 from $10 in January as Micron Technology Inc. of the U.S., Samsung Electronics Inc. of South Korea, and others raised output. Industry analysts say average 64-megabit DRAM prices could fall as low as $4 in the July-September quarter as Micron and others continue to flood the market. NEC, also Japan's largest maker of PCs, lost a record 157.9 billion yen ($1.29 billion) in the year ended March 31 as performance slumped at U.S. computer subsidiary Packard Bell NEC Inc. The world's second-largest chipmaker behind Intel Corp. of the U.S. made a 52 billion yen loss for the year on its chip business, which accounted for 18 percent of total sales. NEC was forced to cut prices so much that chip sales fell 12 percent in the year, to 874.9 billion yen. The company hopes higher sales of more sophisticated and profitable logic chips will fuel a return to profit of 35 billion yen on its chip business this year. Hitachi, Japan's largest overall electronics maker, lost money on chips a second straight year as it too cut prices. The company reported a group net loss of 338.8 billion yen, its first ever, as it lost money on microchips and household electronics and took one-time charges to liquidate and merge subsidiaries. Toshiba and Fujitsu said in December they agreed to work together to develop future generations of memory chips used in PCs and digital consumer appliances. Toshiba and Fujitsu will work to develop 1-gigabit dynamic random-access memory chips, which will eventually replace the 64-megabit DRAMs currently in mass production for use as the main memory in PCs. NEC shares fell 32 yen to 1,462. Hitachi shares rose 4 yen to 1,039. The companies released details of their alliance after Japanese exchanges closed for the day. >

To: Sonki who wrote (31125)	6/23/1999 11:44:00 AM
From: Tito L. Nisperos Jr.	Respond to of 70976

Hi Sonki, It's the same familiar story: --- AMAT going back to where it had gone before. Paul V and Gottfried are always here but the others are elsewhere. For the Weekly/Bi-Weekly Trader: --- From YoYo Release at 67 1/4 To YoYo Drop at 52 3/4, -22% To YoYo Catch at 72 From YoYo Release at 72 yesterday To YoYo Drop at 66 11/16, -7% today thus far (may drop some more, ideal drop is 8-11%) Bears got Wiser patiently waiting for Higher prices to Sell To, Bulls taking it easy... Anyway the Upper Band of the Bollinger Corral (fence going Up the Hill) was Smashed by the Born-Again Bulls who just recently were tamed Cows leisurely Grazing...