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To: Don Green who wrote (42330)	5/16/2000 11:48:00 AM
From: Don Green	Respond to of 93625

S Korea's Samsung Electronics 1Q Net KRW1.596T Dow Jones Newswires May 15, 2000 SEOUL -- South Korea's Samsung Electronics Co. (Q.SSE), the world's largest memory chip maker, said Tuesday its net profit reached 1.596 trillion won ($1=KRW1,115) during the first quarter of this year. It didn't provide comparison figures for the first quarter last year. Meanwhile, its sales reached KRW7.873 trillion in the first three months of this year. The company reported a net profit of KRW3.18 trillion and sales of KRW26.117 trillion in 1999. A spokesman at Samsung Electronics said its net profit and sales reflect an increase in sales of its main chip products, including 64 megabit dynamic random access memory chips, 128 megabit DRAM chips and rambus DRAM chips. Robust sales of its mobile phones and thin film transistor liquefied crystal displays also contributed to its earnings. Samsung Electronics said it expects its net profit to reach around KRW5 to KRW6 trillion this year as global chip prices are expected to rise steadily in the second half of the year. At 0205 GMT (10:05 p.m. EDT Monday), shares of Samsung Electronics were up KRW6,000 to KRW328,000 on volume of 271,260 shares. -By Shin Jung-won; 822-732-2165; jung-won.shin@dowjones.com

To: Don Green who wrote (42330)	5/16/2000 12:23:00 PM
From: Bilow	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 93625

Hi Don Green; Re Samsung increasing RDRAM production by 50% to 3 million per month. Is this true? Do you have a link? It seems to be pretty bad news for RDRAM if so... This is quite a step down from what was being talked about at the beginning of the year: RDRAM output rises at Samsung, Hyundai March 13, 2000 Samsung said it will increase production from the current 2 million units per month to 10 million by the second half of the year. techweb.com So now the figure is an increase from 2 million units to only 3 million units? Quite the reduction. We should put this in perspective by checking on current and expected DDR production from Samsung: Samsung, Hyundai Boost Graphics Memory Speeds The 64-Mbit [DDR] SDRAM is fabricated with Samsung's new 0.17-micron process technology. Company officials said they expect to obtain $300 million in sales from this device alone* in 2000.* techweb.com Note that the above is an estimate for that x32 DDR device alone, it doesn't include the x4, x8 and x16 DDR chips that Samsung and rest of the industry is beginning to roll out right now. At a price of around $15 each, the above Samsung DDR chip is expected by them to sell about 20MM units, or better than 2MM per month for the remainder of the year. Since Samsung is the leading producer of RDRAM, but is a bit behind on DDR (particularly in x32 size), this would indicate that DDR is quite likely to out-ship RDRAM, in terms of units, for 2000. The crossover to DDR is happening a lot faster than I expected. -- Carl

To: Don Green who wrote (42330)	5/16/2000 12:52:00 PM
From: Bilow	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 93625

Hi Don Green; A note on Samsung pricing for RDRAM... Do you suppose it is really the case that Samsung is getting 2.5x pricing for RDRAM as opposed to SDRAM? This would seem like rather bad news for RDRAM to me. But perhaps we should believe it, Samsung has been quite insistent about this: Intel loosens timing spec to spur Rambus usage April 24, 2000 But one RDRAM vendor, Samsung, denied that prices are artificially inflated, and said there is no great difference between the RDRAM selling price and its cost of production. "I've heard that 20 percent figure from Intel about 10 times," said Jay Hoon Chung, manager of DRAM marketing for Samsung Electronics Co. (Seoul, South Korea), currently the largest supplier of RDRAMs. "But 20 percent is not probable by our point of view. We expect the price gap will be 1.5x by the fourth quarter." techweb.com Basically, the memory industry has been all but promising memory designers that if they spec in RDRAM, they are going to have to pay a price premium for the next year. That is in addition to the availability concerns. DDR, by contrast is available as a minor modification to SDRAM in the final weeks of processing. -- Carl P.S. Did I forget to mention that Samsung's 50% increase in RDRAM production (as opposed to the 400% increase talked about back a few months ago) will take at least 10 weeks to make real parts? For that reason, it is going to miss a good bit of the DDR season this summer. The price comparisons are not going to be pretty...

To: Don Green who wrote (42330)	5/16/2000 1:25:00 PM
From: Mihaela	Respond to of 93625

Kingston believes Rambus motherboard tester will lower module, system costs By Jack Robertson Semiconductor Business News (05/16/00, 12:04:40 PM EDT) FOUNTAIN VALLEY, Calif. -- Kingston Technology Inc. here expects that its joint development with Intel Corp. for a Direct Rambus DRAM motherboard tester will finish up its work on systems in the next few weeks. The testers will then be turned over to Intel for validation and made available for production use later this year, according to Kingston officials. Fully automated motherboard testers are essential for Direct Rambus DRAM system applications, said Richard Kanadjian, director of technology at Kingston, which produces memory modules for PCs and computer equipment. Initially, Kingston will build its RC2000 motherboard testers itself for use in a module production. Kanadjian said the firm is considering commercializing the system to be available in the market. "We haven't decided whether we would license the technology for other test equipment companies to build, or whether to outsource production of the RC2000," he added. The RC2000 fully automated tester will have greater throughput and be more advanced than existing systems, according to Kanadjian. He said the system will give Kingston confidence in quality control, allowing its production lines to use sampling testing on Direct Rambus chips and Rambus inline memory modules (RIMMs), instead of the current practice of 100% testing of the parts. Reduced testing will lower costs--an essential move in helping to drive up Rambus memory volumes. "You don't need 100% testing of all chips and modules, if you test all motherboards," Kanadjian claimed. Kingston hopes to accomplish the same efficiency with the RC2000 for Direct Rambus. The technology director also said sampling testing of Direct RDRAM chips and RIMMs would cut capital investment in high-speed testers, since not as many systems would be needed. Kingston is also planning to open a new memory module plant in China next year to be closer to system manufacturers, which have built assembly facilities in the country. A site will be selected for the new plant soon, said Wai Szeto, vice president of strategic business development for Kingston. A prime location for the plant is in the Shenzen area, he said. semibiznews.com