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Technology Stocks : Semi Equipment Analysis -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: richardred who wrote (51683)	4/5/2011 2:01:33 PM
From: robert b furman	1 Recommendation Respond to of 95546

Hi Rich, Agreed on the name. I can remeber how proud I was to have my first TI calculator at GMI. Other students complained because it was easier to use than a slide rule - I hated slide rules. There was a big deal about students wanting calculator outlawed. Our math dean was a progressive thinker and made it official that calculator were allowed. Then some damn EE would come by with his HP galculator with trig functions. AHH what a dawning of what would be. We live in an amazing world. Here I sit in my living room typing on a laptop through my home wireless network. Just 10 years ago this was a dream I had now it is reality. Bob

To: richardred who wrote (51683)	4/6/2011 11:24:04 PM
From: Jacob Snyder	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 95546

re TI-NSM deal: Often when a company buys another in the same industry, big cost-cutting opportunities are available from elimination of duplicate functions. Not so with this deal: TI plans to keep National's research department and sales staff, and estimates just $100 million of synergies in corporate overhead. To achieve its target for return on investment, TI says it can boost National's revenue growth to a level that would be double the analog chip market's growth rate. TI won't say what its growth assumptions are. Gartner analyst Steve Ohr says the market's growth rate will slow. He pegs 2011 growth at 9%, falling to 6% next year and 3.5% in 2013. TI is certainly paying up for the growth potential, valuing National at 21 times this year's earnings, says BMO Capital Markets. That compares with faster-growing analog peers such as Linear Technology, Maxim Integrated Products and Analog Devices, all trading at 14-15 times. online.wsj.com my comment: In general, big acquisitions are a bad idea. The usual story is, they can't grow internally, so they try to buy growth. They usually overpay, often buying at the market top (M&A stops during market or sector downturns, even though everything is on sale). They always talk about synergies and "new market opportunities", and then a few years later, they write off lots of goodwill (an admission, long after the fact, that they overpaid). A better strategy, is for a big company to buy several little companies each year, for their proprietary technology. If your core business isn't growing, then use cash to buy back shares or raise the dividend, rather than trying to pretend you're still a growth company. Lots of mature companies, especially in tech, are still trying to pretend they are adolescents.