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Strategies & Market Trends : Gorilla and King Portfolio Candidates -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: daffydog who wrote (15525)	1/22/2000 12:01:00 PM
From: Eric L	Respond to of 54805

Mark, <<hadn't heard of KOPN until you mentioned it ... MVIS technology ... >> I have demonstrated Kopin display technology on a couple of occasions at trade shows for my former employer who is partnered with them. The KOPN thread here at SI has been in existence for some time and invites (or at least used to) participation from some really heavyweight engineers backgrounded in display technology. You might want to catch up the thread going back to 1996 if you are interested in the sector. Clipped from another thread, courtesy of Ruffian: >> Momentum players are also piling into Kopin (KOPN), a dominant supplier of gallium arsenide HBT (or heterojunction bipolar transistor) wafers for the wireless handset market. Chipmakers use these wafers to make power amplifier circuits that allow clearer signals in wireless phones, while using less power. Demand for HBT wafers is exploding, analysts say, as wireless phone makers race to provide phones that can carry voice and data with less distortion and more battery power. Kopin also makes high-resolution miniature color displays called CyberDisplay, used in camcorders and digital cameras made by JVC, Siemens and others. Earlier this week, the stock climbed $16, or 27%, to a new high of $76 a share, but had slipped back to $68.88 by today. That's on top of a 230% surge over the last six months. Though Kopin appears to have a great story, the huge one-day pop caught a lot of shareholders off guard. One possible explanation tossed around in Yahoo!'s online chat rooms was a recommendation on Microsoft's MoneyCentral site by popular columnist Jon Markman. Others speculated that the company could be acquired. The action actually attracted some institutions to inquire about it, says analyst Karl Motey at C.E. Unterberg, Towbin. But analysts are more intrigued by news that Kopin will double its capacity by adding eight more HBT production systems this year, which should significantly boost earnings and revenue next year. Between the start of last year and this March, the company will have quadrupled its capacity to meet demand for its HBT wafers, says Joel Pitt, at Credit Suisse First Boston. Kopin's main customer is Conexant Systems (CNXT), which announced plans to triple production of HBT-based integrated circuits this year and has contracts with Ericsson (ERICY). Mitsubishi Electronics has already placed orders with Kopin, and Pitt figures Nortel (NT) and other circuit makers could become customers. Kopin doesn't have much competition. RF Micro Devices (RFMD), the only other significant producer of HBT wafers, "can't even supply enough to meet its own needs," Pitt says. Anadigics (ANAD) and Alpha Industries (AHAA) have announced plans to get into the business, but Motey says that demand for the wafers will probably continue to outstrip supply for the next year or longer. Kopin's additional capacity prompted both Pitt and Motey to hike their earnings and revenue estimates for this year. Pitt now expects Kopin to earn 47 cents a share, up from his previous forecast of 40 cents a share and a big jump from the estimates of zero earnings for 1999. He expects revenue to jump 123% this year to $83 million and again next year to $154 million. And those estimates could be "conservative," Pitt says. Still, the stock could give back some - if not all - of that huge gain in the next few days. "We think the company has a really great story," says Pitt. "But the stock may very well reflect unrealistic expectations." In momentum tech, that's nothing new. For more information and analysis of companies and mutual funds, visit SmartMoney.com at smartmoney.com Briefing Book for: KOPN << - Eric -