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Politics : RAMTRONIAN's Cache Inn -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: pat mudge who wrote (7188)	12/23/1999 9:35:00 AM
From: Harvey Allen	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 14464

Ramtron riding high with SmartTrip card By Dave Hirschman/The Gazette Edited by Joan Zales; Headline by Rhonda Van Pelt L. David Sikes, chairman and chief executive at Ramtron International Corp., passed around a plastic subway card at the company's annual meeting Wednesday and grinned. The Washington, D.C., SmartTrip card resembles a credit card but carries a Ramtron memory chip that allows holders to pass through subway turnstiles and pay fares without removing the cards from their wallets. "We have 100,000 of these cards in use in Washington, and we anticipate that number will grow to 500,000," Sikes said. Other large transit systems in the United States and Europe are considering similar equipment. During an hourlong meeting with about 30 investors, company officers and board members at the Hilton Garden Inn, Sikes touted such "smart card" chips as one of several potential growth areas for the Colorado Springs chip maker. Others include "thin film" for night-vision devices and new chips for the communications industry. Sikes said Fujitsu of Japan has agreed to invest $8 million in Ramtron over two years and lent the company $15 million in new equipment. Ramtron also raised $5.4 million in December by selling additional stock and warrants. Ramtron plans to introduce a host of new products, expand its marketing force from five employees to 10 and boost sales from $1 million a quarter to $1 million a month by the end of 2000. "If we put these planks in place, there's absolutely no reason we won't be profitable," he said. Ramtron lost $19.1 million in 1998 and $8.9 million in 1997. Ramtron has survived a series of financial crises in its 15-year history, including a restructuring this year in which investors endured a 5-to-1 reverse stock split. "Companies like Ramtron are high-risk, high-reward investments," Sikes said. "Ramtron is a high-risk investment." At Wednesday's meeting, shareholders approved a plan to reserve 1.2 million shares for employee stock options and re-elected five directors to the company's board. Ramtron shares (RMTR) closed Wednesday at $7.40, down 59 cents on the Nasdaq market. gazette.com