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

To: miklosh who wrote (33712)	1/12/2000 5:32:00 PM
From: Rob-Chemist	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 70976

Certainly a surprise that AMAT chose to buy a company that makes mask making equipment. If one takes the press release at face value, the biggest potential advantage for AMAT would be that they could advertise themselves as "one-stop" shopping for mask making outfits - get mask writers and inspection units all at one place. However, I wonder if the real reason for buying ETEC is that AMAT sees ebeam (or, less likely, laser) technology being useful as an alternative to the classical plasma etching for ultrafine chip structures.