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Technology Stocks : Semi Equipment Analysis -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: The Ox who wrote (10332)	6/26/2003 5:44:04 PM
From: Return to Sender	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 95541

Semiconductor Equipment . . . Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing has announced a filing with the SEC for a global offering of 79 million ADSs with all of the securities being sold by shareholders. Goldman Sachs and Merrill Lynch are handling the stock sale with the underwriters having the option to purchase 11.8 million ADSs in case of significant demand. The 79 million ADSs are the equivalent to 395 million common shares. Semiconductors . . . Sandisk has filed a complaint of declaratory relief with the U.S. District Court for Northern California against Infineon Technologies AG. The complaint seeks a declaratory judgment that SanDisk does not infringe U.S. Patent No. 5,726,601 (the "'601 patent") and that the '601 patent is invalid. SanDisk believes that its products do not infringe the '601 patent, as alleged in a letter received from Infineon. Co believes Infineon's correspondence was motivated by Infineon's announced intention to become a flash supplier. ATI Tech surprised on the upside with its May quarter results and August quarter guidance. May-Quarter revenues of $342 million (up 7.4% Quarter over Quarter) beat estimates of $300 million and consensus of $305 million (down 4.2% Quarter over Quarter). Adjusted EPS at $0.07 beat our and consensus estimate of $0.04. It was a better than expected improvement in gross margin contributed to the earnings upside -- gross margin increased 4 points to 32.9%. The positive surprise in revenue vs guidance was mainly due to an improvement in desktop ASPs, which were up about 20% Quarter over Quarter at the chip level. The increase was driven by a significant portion of shipments of new products during the quarter (Radeon 9800, 9600, & 9200 desktop GPUs). ATI gained market share from NVIDIA on the desktop side and expect the share gain to continue in 2nd half 2003. ATI guided for August quarter revenues in the $335-$365mn range (mid-point up 2.3% Quarter over Quarter), better than consensus estimate of $321 million. Expect a significant ramp in desktop integrated products in the November Quarter, after shipments of the new IGP family begin in August. Expect ATI's desktop IGP to be very competitive, and forecast its share to increase to 10% in 4th quarter from virtually 0% today. RobBlack.com MarketWrap: robblack.com

To: The Ox who wrote (10332)	6/26/2003 7:49:52 PM
From: Big Bucks	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 95541

I doubt that few, if any, Americans realize that once Asian manufacturers have >85% of the global chip manufacturing capacity that they will have huge pricing leverage along the lines of OPEC with which to dictate future chip prices. Up to this point there has been nearly cut-throat pricing due to competition, and that competition is driving many companies out of the chip manufacturing business. As more and more non-profitable companies drop out it leaves fewer competitors, mostly Asian foundries with leading edge technology capabilities. Most of these companies are subsized by their governments with various incentives which gives them and unfair advantage over US and European companies who are trying to compete. True, labor costs are dirt cheap and environmental concerns and regulations are of low concern in Asia, but eventually dominating companies who continue to specialize will corner specific market segments and be able to demand higher prices. Where else will purchasers of chips be able to go to negotiate better pricing if there are no other global fabs with the necessary production capability? In 10 years there will only be a small handful of US chip manufacturers with the experience and technological capability to compete and then only in specialty niche market segments. If Taiwan eventually decides to politically rejoin mainland China it would likely mean that >60%-70% of global chip production would be under the control of the Chinese government. Even now mainland China is building new chip manufacturing plants, and several Taiwanese companies are sponsoring these endeavors looking toward the future. The question is can the US and European companies afford to let their Asian competitors drive them out of business over the long term?? Also, why isn't the US government giving similar tax breaks and other financial incentives to US high technology companies to insure that they can afford to compete in the global market place and maintain our technological edge and expertise of the workforce. The US has lost too many of the technologies that were developed here to Asian companies.....along with the jobs those technologies provided. BB