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Technology Stocks : Applied Materials No-Politics Thread (AMAT) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Proud_Infidel who wrote (8278)	12/11/2003 8:29:55 AM
From: Proud_Infidel	Respond to of 25522

NAND Players Advance 300mm Manufacturing Date By Harry Yeates -- Electronics Weekly, 12/10/2003 Toshiba Corp. and SanDisk are bringing forward the date when they will begin the manufacture of NAND flash on 300mm wafers. Against a background of severe shortages -- with only 65 percent to 70 percent supply coverage -- the two companies now expect to jointly bring a new 300mm fab at Yokkaichi into production in 2005, rather than 2006. "We expect the market to double in scale in the period 2003 to 2006," said Shigeo Koguchi, president of Toshiba Semiconductor. "The markets for NAND flash memory are expected to outstrip our existing sources of supply," said Harari, president and CEO of SanDisk. NAND market leaders Samsung and Toshiba expect the shortages to continue until the end of 2004. Construction of the plant will start next year. The two companies will share the cost of equipping the plant and Toshiba will pay for the shell. The cost of the fab will be $1.9 billion. It will be operated by FlashVision, the companies' joint venture for NAND flash memories. Initially it will be equipped to produce 10,000 wafers a month using 70nm process technology. The NAND flash market is the fastest growing product area in the semiconductor industry, growing 44 percent in 2003, according to iSuppli, and worth $4.4 billion this year. Other suppliers are trying to increase production. Renesas Technology, which includes the former flash businesses of Hitachi and Mitsubishi, is ramping up NAND flash at its 300mm Trecenti fab and, next year, starts outsourcing product to Powerchip of Taiwan. Meanwhile, Samsung is turning over half a 300mm fab -- worth 10,000 wafers a month -- to NAND flash. New entrants to the market, STMicroelectronics/Hynix and Infineon Technologies, plan to begin volume production in Q4 2003 and Q1 2004, respectively. Electronics Weekly is the London-based sister publication of Electronic News.