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Technology Stocks : Helix Technology, a cold play on semiconductor equipment -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: robert b furman who wrote (1054)	10/18/2002 1:09:10 PM
From: j t jackson	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1227

Bob...indivusal wafer process steps under vacuum take from a few seconds to a few minutes. Most wafer fab lines start 25,000, 200mm diameter silicon wafers per month. Since there are many chips per wafer, the number of chips per month is quite large. A single wafer may go into and out of a vacuum chamber 20 to 40 times from start to finish during the processing of a silicon wafer into a finished semiconductor wafer. Depending on the mass flow of gas into the cryopump they are capable of running from hundreds to thousands of hours between regeneration steps. Regards...jtj