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To: Ian@SI who wrote (498)	7/15/1999 5:15:00 PM
From: Andrew Vance	Respond to of 1138

Hi Ian, I have been reading this thread for the past few days based on a message sent to me relating to some of my RadarView comments on the subject. I read with great interest, the comments made by Olduvai and I agree with most of what was stated. And as always, I read your posts with a great deal of interest. ASYT has some outstanding issues with Jenoptiks and Infab, I believe, which they are pursuing aggressively. ASYT is very much ingrained in the marketplace and had no real competitors up until now. ASYT has had a great deal of time to perfect their systems and they are robust. My experience goes back more than a decade so I know what the first systems were like. I had the honor of working on the 4" Arms and Pods, along with some of the first 6" systems. For all of their robustness now, I saw the warts and was part of the process that not only improved the reliability but also helped develop some of the newer configurations that became available for 6" processing. The point is, ASYT has come a long way to be where they are today. the road was rocky at time due to the mini-environment deficiencies that I was personally intrenched in during the early days. They have come a long way here in both design and materials. Schedule commitments have always been an issue for me when dealing with ASYT and I am sure that has improved. The competition may be down the road but the recent BRKS-Infab announcement is significant since it does present a very strong competitor when they get their act together. That is key for all to consider. For all the faults of Jenoptik-Infab, I believe BRKS has the capacity to make the appropriate changes to improve functionality and reliability. FOUP is a viable alternative and a viable complement to ASYT's product offering and there is room for both. there are some logistical issues to integrating both but they are easily overcome with hybrid transfer equipment. Personally, I would want to go as much with ASYT as possible and then use BRKS on special circumstances but that is a personal preference. Just as ASYT went through a learning curve, so can this new merged effort. as ASYT becomes unable to deliver on programs due to backlog, BRKS will get it fair share and grow into contention. Timing is what has been discussed here along with reliability so the question is where the value is, now or later. That point is something I will not debate since a case could be made for each side. However, the tools, the people and the basic engineering designs are present to be successful. Management issues will be worked through and BRKS has the quality infrastructure to address the reliability issues and make this thing work. SMIF and WIT (Wafer Isolation Technology) are becoming ingrained in the industry so it does not matter if BRKS cannot meet the immediate demand. the Demand will be there and all BRKS does is miss this round of opportunities (maybe). The readers here should know that I am probably one of the biggest Bulls relative to ASYT and probably one of their biggest proponents from a practical standpoint. I was involved in numerous ASYT projects during my career and consulted on a good number of programs. ASYT plays a key role in the RadarView portfolio of preferred investments. With that said, we have been acquiring BRKS over the past months as a means of covering all bases in this field since all of these companies should prosper in the upcoming recovery. This includes PRIA. Of the 3, BRKS and ASYT have performed the best. Presently, we are moving to a stronger position and higher regard for BRKS. So for all it wrinkles and warts AND our pre-disposition towards ASYT, we see BRKS star rising over the next quarters. Andrew Vance RadarView Financial Newsletter avance@radarview.com BTW - Our subscribers are extremely pleased since our most recent position in BRKS is averaged at $18.88 and we placed a $30 target on the stock back on 4/29. As you know, we hit that target intra-day today. The target was placed when BRKS was at $20, making this a 50% gain in one quarter and slightly higher from the Q1 major entries into this stock. We even played a few volatility cycles with great success.<GG>

To: Ian@SI who wrote (498)	7/15/1999 11:03:00 PM
From: jsabelko	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1138

Collection of interesting infab links I was doing a little digging on infab and thought I'd share a few links. Although it will undoubtedly take some time for BRKS and Infab to develop and mesh their technologies and cultures, I don't think brks and infab are late for 300 mm. Any comments are welcome. Infab press releases infab.com Technical Articles infab.com Fab automation projects infab.com Korea 300 mm pilot?? edtn.com More 300 mm edtn.com Dec 1998 interview with new president (notice how he complements BRKS/Fastech) edtn.com Recent VLSI project win edtn.com