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Technology Stocks : Cymer (CYMI) NEWS ONLY! -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: ben luong who wrote (161)	11/13/1997 11:50:00 AM
From: Paul Dieterich	Respond to of 582

Will Asian currency crisis accelerate sales for Cymer? It's becoming apparent that trouble in the SE Asian markets may actually be good for Cymer's sales. Witness the paradox in what Texas Instrument's Kevin McGarity had to say in his speech at the Prudential Securities 14th Annual 1997 High-Technology Conference New York: ''One of the fallouts with the Southeast Asia currency crisis may be a reduction in capital spending for DRAM wafer fabs by Taiwan, Korea and Southeast Asian countries. Construction is being stretched out or postponed, and the appetites for governments to subsidize these facilities appears to be diminishing. ''Let me add here that capital spending for conversion to 0.25 micron equipment, particularly for advanced logic, is expected to remain strong." (http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/971112/tx_texas_instruments_1.html) It cannot be denied that SC fabs are scaling back their cap equip expenditures. Today Hitachi announced that they postponing a new Texas IC fab for one year: techweb.cmp.com Yet on the same day Hitachi also announces a 360 MIPS MPU based on .25 process: halsp.hitachi.com Process shrinking leads to higher performance and more efficient output. Thus in time of cutback, it is practically mandatory to advance to a finer process. Micron Technology's recent manufacturing moves supports this overall trend. It recently suspended plans to build a new plant, investing the money instead on updating exsisting fabs to .25 micron process: "[Micron's] Mailloux said in February 1996, Micron put its planned fab in Lehi, Utah, on indefinite hold, a move that decreased its potential wafer starts by 50 percent. Solely through process shrinks to 0.3 micron and a conversion of all its capacity to 8-inch wafers from 6-inch wafers, Micron, in Boise, Idaho, has been able to double bit output of DRAM during the past year, according to Mailloux. Plans to move to 0.25-micron and smaller geometries during the next year could double bit output again in 1998 without additional fabs, he said. Mailloux said other DRAM producers have not reduced production, but have only limited the size of production increases throughout the DRAM downturn." (http://www.techweb.com/investor/news/1997/11/1107mu.html) In the present environment, I wouldn't like to be long AMAT. But CYMER can only benefit from capital expenditure cutbacks in an increasingly competitive atmosphere. Of course, as to why CYMI's price is currently 17 1/2, I dunno. That just sucks. Serious debate welcome. Best Regards, --PD