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Technology Stocks : Seagate Technology -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Nathan Shulman who wrote (3894)	10/23/1997 2:01:00 PM
From: Gus	Respond to of 7841

Nathan, I think IBM and SEG have a broad cross-licensing agreement so a merger may not be necessary or even wise. This is all part of the 'let's cross-license and then compete in the marketplace' attitude that Shugart has been promoting as a way to reduce the frequency of expensive patent infringement lawsuits. Anyway, below is the link to the EE article re: the fluid bearing motors. Some excerpts... ....Within Seagate, people liken this shift to the moves in recent years to PRML read channels and magnetoresistive heads, changes that completely replaced technologies in place for years. "We have a clear forecast for all of our products to make a complete phase-over to fluid-bearing motors in 3 1/2 years," said Gunter Heine, vice president of the motor group. "By the end of the year 2000, we feel all our drives will use fluid-bearing motors. This is exactly the same type of sea change we saw a few years ago with MR heads......" "......Analysts predict that other drive makers will also switch from bearing motors. "This has to happen between now and the turn of the century," said Dennis Waid, president of Peripheral Research (Santa Barbara, Calif.). "Everyone is pushing for higher spindle speeds, like the 14,400-rpm programs some people have started. You can't do 14,400 rpm with bearing motors. I think we'll see a lot more of this to decrease noise, improve shock resistance and avoid non-repetitive runout......." ....Seagate began investing in facilities to make fluid motors last year in order to make the transition. It may be tougher for firms that are not vertically integrated and rely on third-party suppliers. "One interesting thing about motors is that you're looking at creating bricks and mortar to get them into production," Waid said. "If the industry needed a large number of fluid motors in a short time, there isn't the industry capacity to do it." techweb.com Gus