Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Politics : Formerly About Applied Materials -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Paul V. who wrote (27638)	1/8/1999 5:19:00 PM
From: Proud_Infidel	Respond to of 70976

January 8, 1999 (HO CHI MINH CITY, Vietnam) -- The Vietnamese PC market will reach a volume of 300,000 units in 1999, according to a forecast issued recently by the Vietnam Computer Association. Mai Anh, general secretary of the VCA, said the estimated volume of PC sales in Vietnam at the end of this year is 250,000 units, versus 190,000 last year. nikkeibp.asiabiztech.com

To: Paul V. who wrote (27638)	1/8/1999 9:40:00 PM
From: blake_paterson	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 70976

Paul - Looks like all back-end semi-equip longs should be rooting for Rambus: Memory makers face decisions on Direct Rambus DRAMs By David Lammers EE Times (01/08/99, 4:59 p.m. EDT) SANTA CLARA, Calif. — Memory makers are struggling with decisions on how much back-end equipment to purchase to support Direct Rambus DRAMs later this year. Their decisions are complicated by uncertainty over demand for the new memory and how much of a premium customers will pay for it. Bullish analysts predict about 250 million units of the Direct RDRAMs will ship in 1999. Intel Corp. will ship prototypes of its Camino chip set with support for Direct RDRAMs this quarter, and major PC OEMs are expected to ship systems with a 0.18-micron Katmai processor, Camino and Direct RDRAMs by the third quarter. But the ramp of the Direct RDRAM remains a big unknown. NEC is trying to decide how many testers and other back-end equipment must be ordered now to meet Direct RDRAM demand. NEC has more experience manufacturing RDRAMs than any other vendor by virtue of its supply relationship with Nintendo Ltd. (Kyoto, Japan), which used the 18-Mbit RDRAM in its Nintendo 64 game machine. "We have shipped tons of Rambus memories to Nintendo," said Hirokazu Hashimoto, president of NEC Electronics Inc. "From the silicon point of view, changing from SDRAM to the Direct RDRAM is not so difficult," said Hashimoto. "But a lot of testers are needed. One estimate is that an investment at the back end of about $8 million to $10 million is needed to produce 1 million units of Direct RDRAM. If you assume that the industry will have enough 0.25-micron capacity at the front end, the question is whether the industry will invest the $2.5 billion or so needed to support the 250-million-unit Direct RDRAM scenario." Japanese companies will need to invest to keep up with the production of Micron Technology, Samsung Electronics and the combined chip operations of Hyundai-LG Semicon. But Hashimoto noted that "Japanese companies are in a very, very tight financial situation this year" because of continuing problems in Japan's domestic economy. He declined to speculate on whether NEC would increase its semiconductor-related capital expenditures, but said that the head of NEC's electronic devices operation, Hajime Sasaki, has stated that NEC wants to retain a 10 to 15 percent share of the worldwide DRAM market. NEC held 11 percent of the market last year, Hashimoto said. NEC garnered $1.7 billion in semiconductor revenue in North America last year, down from more than $2 billion in 1995. Based on the need for more expensive testing and packaging, Hashimoto said the Rambus solution could result in about a $100 premium for PC systems, compared with a similar system stuffed with synchronous DRAMs. The Rambus architecture can double the memory bandwidth in a typical system, according to Rambus (Mountain View, Calif.). "The thing we must watch is how many customers will pay the $100 difference to get improved graphics," Hashimoto said. "Perhaps Intel will price the CPU and chip set so that the system cost comes out to be more attractive, with the promised performance increase. My personal view is that we will see shipments of about 150 million to 200 million Rambus memories this year." Stuart Atkins, a marketing analyst for module vendor Kingston Technologies (Irvine, Calif.), said he's heard that Direct RDRAM premiums will be in the 10 to 25 percent range over conventional SDRAMs. It is unclear what effect the premium will have on the device's success, he said. "Then you've got [licensing] royalties also," he said. "In a PC market with price premiums and a market under price pressures, do the DRAM manufacturers want to pass those premiums on? That's a big question." Premiums are easier to pass along at the high end, where Direct RDRAMs will first be targeted, he said. DRAM makers are evaluating Rambus testers now from all of the major tester manufacturers. Hewlett-Packard Co. has developed a Rambus tester that can handle 32 devices in parallel. The system is not yet completely production worthy, and its price tag is $3 million to $5 million. Advantest Corp. has fielded a tester that can handle eight Direct RDRAMs in parallel, and other tester companies are readying systems for benchmarking. The high cost of those testers, the need for chip-scale packaging and increased testing for Rambus-in-line memory modules (RIMMs) will result in a stiff premium — as much as 60 percent — at the device level for the Direct RDRAMs later this year.