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Technology Stocks : Veeco Instruments-Who? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Carl R. who wrote (2378)	8/11/1999 11:22:00 PM
From: Sam	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 3069

Carl, <<Less price pressure could mean less volume, and less competition could mean slower transitions to new technology.>> At this point, nothing is going to affect the speed of the transition to GMR. WDC isn't leaving the scene tomorrow (though I personally wish they would), and besides, everyone that matters pretty much has their roadmap set up. In fact, you could say that anyone who doesn't have their roadmap set up at this point doesn't matter by definition. They're toast given the way this business works. And, much as I hate to say it, price pressure ain't goin' away. It may lessen a little, but it ain't goin' away. And I doubt very much that whatever lessening occurs will affect volume even one iota. Welcome back from me, too, Stitch. Pleased to hear from you again. Regards, Sam

To: Carl R. who wrote (2378)	8/16/1999 7:35:00 PM
From: Stitch	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 3069

Hi Carl; <<I agree that a shakeout of the disk sector is in order, and will happen, quite possibly by shaking out say WDC and APM. It is not clear to me however that this will benefit VECO in the short run . Less price pressure could mean less volume, and less competition could mean slower transitions to new technology.>> Again, my apologies for these spotty replies. I am still in the hinterlands on assignment. The drive back to downtown Bangkok is two hours and I normally don't leave until 8 - 9 at night. Very little time to be sociable on SI is left, not to mention that internet roaming costs are high. With regard to your concerns I suspect, like Sam, that competition will not dissipate a great deal with the loss, say, of APM or WDC. The edge will be blunted a bit, but that should spur more confidence in investing in cap ex. I think it may be a non sequitor to extrapolate that this would represent a slowing to VECO. The race for higher densities will never go away IMO. And it is here that VECO shines in three of its product lines IMO. Over the past several years areal density has increased at a rate of approximately 60% per year. The trend is expected to continue with one important difference. Most of the gains so far have come from higher recording densities (linear density) with only modest increases in track density (radial density). Today track densities are typically less then 12,000 track per inch. Most observers agree that the gains yet to come will primarily be from track density improvements and forecasters point to in excess of 25K tpi in 4-5 years. This places tremendous pressure on head design and production(as well as other secondary and tertiary designs as well of course, such as servos, actuators, suspension assemblys, etc.). VECO's deposition and etch product lines are especially lined up well but meterology will only increase in importance as well. There acquisition of Wyko, DI, and eventually Optimag, should pay nice dividends, whether WDC or APM are with us or not. I think Sam is right, competition will be around a while to continue to drive players towards VECO's type of solutions. But even more exciting is that I suspect we will have customers for these densities. We need to keep an eye on apps. It is already clear that the math says you don't use older technologies to make cheap disk drives. You use new technology to populate less components, and use it across the product line to achieve economies of scale. By the way, WDC has recently laid off another several hundred people in Singapore as they step up their shift to Kuala Lumpur. (Too little too late). I have been saying for months that APM is dead and to dumb to fall over. Best, Stitch (better late then never - <G> )