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To: Steve Lee who wrote (14953)	9/24/2000 11:09:22 AM
From: docpaul	Respond to of 60323

Hi Steve, <<Does SSTI's concentration on low density NOR for code storage leave them open to the risk of being obsoleted by embedded RAM on the processor die itself?>> Dunno how closely you've been following their business plans lately, but in fact embedded technology is the fastest growing area of the company. Superflash technology has been cited as one of the easiest embeddable technologies.. main reason why it's been licensend by everyone from Motorola to TSMC (under the name EMB-flash).. analysts and management predict that 50% of their revenues next year will in fact come from embedded products.. They've even done some of their own products such as the combo MCU / flash product.. SSTI does not enter into a market unless there's a guaranteed profit stream that comes along with it. As you can imagine, there's no need for them to.. They have ~50 products now, and the CFO has told me to expect ~80 before year end, which I would imagine would mostly be new embedded prodcts.. <<I was interested in your comment that SSTI makes flash for the i820 board. Is this the only Intel board they make flash for?>> I actually oversimplifed things.. it's all 800 series boards.. 815, 820, and 840.. along with all of the other subdelineations.. 815e, etc.. keep in mind that Intel makes it's own MBs, and other companies use the chipset to make their own, as well.. <<Do non Intel boards using i820 chipsets use SSTI flash by default or are the board manufacturers free to mix and match?>> Well, what I do know are a few things.. SSTI's flash has been approved and/or certified for use in both Pheonix and AMI Bios.. which is over 85% of the market.. so the potential use is huge.. Bing Yeh has said on a teleconference that they are the #1 bios chip supplier, but I don't have any specific numbers.. <<Does the fact that the i820 was meant to be Intel's mainstream Pentium 3 chipset, but is now not (due to the necessity to introduce the i815) leave SSTI open to the possibility of performing below some previous expectations?>> See above.. they've shipped well over 500,000 units of this by what's been written (I'm sure the number is now much higher), so I don't think the expectations have been undermet.. and as above, they have support for the other chipsets in the 8xx series.. but it's a good question.. I'll let you know when I listen to the telco on October 19th.. All the best, docpaul