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Technology Stocks : WDC/Sandisk Corporation -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Dave who wrote (24317)	12/17/2003 8:29:53 AM
From: Art Bechhoefer	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 60323

Dave, the best answer to your concern over Hynix and STM entering the market is to look at the experiences of QUALCOMM and its chip competitors. QUALCOMM has licensed its chip designs for CDMA wireless handsets to several manufacturers, but somehow none of them have made a dent into QUALCOMM's more than 90 percent market share. OK, QCOM is more proprietary than SNDK flash memory, but there still is a combination of IP and manufacturing know how in SanDisk's equation. A great deal of SNDK design work has gone into the improvement of the manufacturing process and the reliability of the product. Not all of this is patented. A lot of it depends on good manufacturing practice, a feat not easy to emulate by others not as experienced in the technology. Apparently there are enough investors/tradors who are willing to speculate on the downside. But I doubt that they have anything solid on which to speculate, other than the direction the rest of the sheep are heading. Art

To: Dave who wrote (24317)	12/17/2003 9:22:24 AM
From: Ausdauer	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 60323

Dave, I share the same opinion as Limtex on this matter. It took SNDK several years to migrate from 64 & 128 megabit to the current 2 gigabit flash density and Eli was cautious about yield issues and technological concerns at each level of process technology. For a newcomer to start a NAND fab and state they are going to lead off with an extremely high density product on their first attempt at mass production seems quite bold. I don't think this is at all like baking a chocolate chip cookie as you mention. Also, I hope competitors are willing to absorb the initial start up losses and the potential outcome that their initial flash chips are not cost-competitive with Samsung and FlashVisions products. There is also signficant potential for SNDK to exercise its patent portfolio. SNDK has been extremely successful in negotiating such agreements and even Samsung had to cave in despite its initial reluctance to renew the cross-licensing arrangement. Aus