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

To: etchmeister who wrote (16820)	12/13/2005 10:29:22 AM
From: Proud_Infidel	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 25522

Elpida could be next to enter flash Mark LaPedus EE Times (12/13/2005 10:15 AM EST) SAN JOSE, Calif. — Renesas Technology Corp.’s recent move to exit the flash-memory market portends the long-awaited shakeout in the arena. But it also could mean a possible new entry into the flash-memory business: Elpida Memory Inc., according to analysts. As reported, Japan’s Renesas will halt the development of its AG-AND flash memory, but said it will continue manufacturing and supplying current flash memory products. A Renesas spokeswoman admitted that it will no longer develop the 8-Gbit memory or higher-density memories (see Dec. 8 story). The move by Renesas did not surprise analysts, which for years have predicted a shakeout in the overall flash-memory market. Renesas itself was also falling behind in the NAND flash-memory market against the likes of Samsung, Toshiba, Hynix, among others. “The NAND market has claimed its first victim [in Renesas],” said Jim Handy, an analyst with Semico Research Corp., in an e-mail newsletter. “Renesas' AG-AND has the tightest layout of any NAND chip we know of, and the company thoroughly mastered the difficulties of MLC years ago,” Handy said. “Nevertheless, Renesas did not devote the enormous production resources to this tough market that their competitors did.” For example, Samsung, Hynix, Micron and others continue to convert excess DRAM capacity at a frantic pace to gain market share in NAND flash. “Without a very high run rate, [Renesas’] R&D efforts were distributed over fewer chips, drawing away from any possibility of a slim profit margin,” he said, adding that Renesas can now focus on its core microcontroller, system-on-a-chip (SoC) and other products. “By focusing on products that will be designed into a system by working with engineers rather than commodities that are selected solely on price at the buyers' desks, the company is grooming itself for far more predictable revenues and a chance of continuing profits.” The analyst also speculated that Renesas’ loss could be Elpida’s gain. In other words, Japanese DRAM vendor Elpida could enter the flash market. “Perhaps the company's DRAM cousin Elpida will pick up this ball,” he said. “It was unlikely that Renesas and Elpida would be allowed to compete against each other, but Elpida, as a DRAM firm, had good reasons to move into NAND.” In 2002, Renesas was formed by the merger of the non-DRAM operations of Hitachi Ltd. and Mitsubishi Electric Corp. In 1999, NEC Corp. and Hitachi formed a joint venture DRAM company called Elpida. Elpida sells DRAMs, but has yet to enter the flash business.

To: etchmeister who wrote (16820)	12/14/2005 8:52:53 AM
From: Proud_Infidel	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 25522

Fake footprints fool biometric readers Gregg Keizer TechWeb.com (12/13/2005 2:55 PM EST) Researchers fooled biometric systems with fake fingerprints made out of Play-Doh nine out of ten times, demonstrating a weakness of some computer security systems. Led by Stephanie Schuckers, an associate professor of electrical and computer engineering at Potsdam, N.Y.-based Clarkson University, the researchers tested 66 Play-Doh copies of real fingerprints of 11 different people. The fake fingerprints were verified as the real deal 90 percent of the time. "As with any identification or security system, biometric devices are prone to 'spoofing’ or attacks designed to defeat them," said Schuckers in a statement. Schuckers also tested cadaver fingers on fingerprint readers, and got the same results. In some of the tests, dismembered fingers passed 94 percent of the time. Security relying on fingerprints can be beefed up, she said, by accounting for perspiration on real fingers. Schuckers and her team created an algorithm that detects the moisture pattern on live fingers; when this was added to the readers, spoofing success fell to less than 10 percent. Schuckers’ research is funded by $3.1 million from the National Science Foundation (NSF), the Department of Homeland Security, and the Department of Defense.