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Technology Stocks : Rambus (RMBS) - Eagle or Penguin -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Tom Gebing who wrote (8767)	10/18/1998 9:53:00 AM
From: Tom Gebing	Respond to of 93625

Experts applaud Intel's Micron memory deal By Matthew Broersma, ZDNN October 16, 1998 4:33 PM PT Industry analysts said Intel Corp.'s $500 million stake in Micron Technologies Friday is a long-term bet that could lead to a big payoff once the memory market comes out of its downturn. The investment also continues an Intel strategy to eliminate bottlenecks that may keep users from taking advantage of the speed of faster and faster microprocessors. "Once the [memory] market starts to tighten up, and comes out of its present slump, in 2000 or 2002, we could see a pretty significant DRAM shortage," said Mel Thomson, a senior analyst with MicroDesign Resources Inc. "That's happened before ... [and Intel] is trying to get in front of that, and make sure it doesn't happen." 'Intel realized those bottlenecks as a general threat to being able to sell higher-speed processors.' -- Analyst Mike Feibus Intel (Nasdaq:INTC) bought 6 percent of Micron (NYSE:MU), a manufacturer of computer memory chips, to ensure its supply of Direct Rambus Dynamic RAM (DRDRAM), a special type of memory that it plans to use in its next-generation microprocessor architecture. Since processor speeds have been increasing far faster than the speeds of memory products, memory has quickly become a bottleneck hampering faster PC performance overall. Intel's solution is to introduce DRDRAM into the microprocessor architecture, allowing for faster memory access. "Intel realized those bottlenecks as a general threat to being able to sell higher-speed processors," said Mike Feibus, principal analyst with Mercury Research. "[They] realize that consumers aren't stupid, they're not going to spend money on a fancy processor if it's twiddling its thumbs." zdnet.com

To: Tom Gebing who wrote (8767)	10/18/1998 9:53:00 AM
From: MileHigh	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 93625

Tom, Well said. Also, I have been reading that the next wave of DRAM products will be more differentiated and less commodity oriented. INTC is also concerned about production availability for RMBS. RDRAM will require new back end test equipment and new demands on the DRAM players. They did not see the DRAM players moving quick enough in terms of infrastructure implementation so they gave MU "a little push". Alan, These are a few of the reasons I think INTC bought a chunk of MU. I posted an article yesterday that outlines RDRAM availability concerns. Even if the OEM's started to order RDRAM in quantity, the DRAM players are only ready to produce so much and MU is the #2 DRAM player and they have been hesitant to adopt RDRAM standard because of the royalty issue. Intel fixed that. Also, an additional investment in RMBS by Intel would not have sped up the adoption and DRAM players infrastructure concerns. An investment in the DRAM players themselves will certainly influence the speed in which they adopt and produce RMBS architecture! MileHigh

To: Tom Gebing who wrote (8767)	10/18/1998 11:09:00 AM
From: unclewest	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 93625

RMBS, MU,INTC i totally agree with your assessment. by investing in mu, intc is assuring themselves of a ready local supply of rdram. remember the korean samsung has screwed intc in the past. i think mu and intc are exc long. but the purest play for rdram remains rmbs. i have been reading so much about pc's using rmbs. i wonder if the other uses ie. cell phones, hdtv etc., are going to be the real profit centers. can you imagine rmbs technology in your pc, gps, phone, tv, the royalties will go on and on.