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Technology Stocks : Micron Only Forum -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Dave Gahm who wrote (42277)	1/15/1999 10:06:00 PM
From: Thomas G. Busillo	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 53903

David, here is an quick study of the specific language that Micron management choose to use in all of its press releases over the last 9 quarters on the subject of "megabit output". You will notice two things. 1. The choice of language in one particular report is noticably different in its absence of specific reference to "megabit(s)". 2. If the most recent 10-Q is correct regarding the 10% decline in megabits (as opposed to the last earnings release stating a 10% increase in "output"), and if the statements contained in excerpts below are corroborated by 10-Q's for the corresponding periods, wouldn't this be first quarter in at least 8 quarters (and possibly more) where megabit growth declined sequentially? I'm cynical, but the amount of ineptitude this would imply on the part of the sell-side analysts covering this company if that actually happened and none of them noted it makes me want to think "no, it can't be. There are 'well-respected' 'research' teams out there and they would have picked up on this." Someone out there had to have picked up on this? Right? Is it something else apart from whatever constraints they were facing? Is this a change in competitive tactics someone who gets paid to understand this company presumably would be interested in? If this has more to do with strategy than operations, wouldn't there be implications? Anyway, here's the stuff from the PR's. I hope to do similar stuff w/ the 10-Q's over the weekend. 1st Quarter 1997 : micron.com The Company's semiconductor operations more than doubled megabit production in the first quarter of fiscal 1997 compared to the first quarter of fiscal 1996, and achieved a 48% increase in megabit production for the first quarter of fiscal 1997 over the fourth quarter of fiscal 1996. 2nd Quarter 1997 : micron.com The Company's semiconductor operations increased megabit production* by 55% in the second quarter of fiscal 1997 compared to the first quarter of fiscal 1997.* 3rd Quarter 1997 : micron.com The Company's megabit production of semiconductor memory increased by 31% in the third quarter of fiscal 1997 compared to the second quarter of fiscal 1997, primarily due to further yield improvements on the 16 Meg DRAM... 4th Quarter 1997 : micron.com ...Without building additional fabs, semiconductor megabit output* increased substantially during fiscal 1997...* 1st Quarter 1998 : micron.com ...The Company's ramp of its 16 Meg Synchronous DRAM constrained the increase in semiconductor megabit output* in the first quarter of fiscal 1998 to less than 10%.* 2nd Quarter 1998 : micron.com ...Test capacity constraints, previously limiting overall productivity gains, were substantially resolved in the last few weeks of the second quarter, allowing megabits of production to increase 10% as compared to the first quarter of fiscal 1998... 3rd Quarter 1998: micron.com The Company's semiconductor memory operations increased megabits sold in the third quarter by 45% over the immediately preceding quarter as a result of manufacturing efficiencies achieved on the latest generation 16 Meg and 64 Meg DRAM parts. 4th Quarter 1998: micron.com Paragraph 2 (annual comparison): The Company's memory output was significantly higher in fiscal 1998 than in 1997, principally as a result of manufacturing efficiencies and aggressive transitions from .30 to .21 line-width devices. Paragraph 5 (sequential comparison): The Company's semiconductor memory operations increased megabits sold in the fourth fiscal quarter by 63 percent over the third fiscal quarter in part due to a 39 percent decrease in finished goods inventory. 1st Quarter 1999 - micron.com In the first quarter of fiscal 1999, total semiconductor memory output* increased approximately 10% as compared to the fourth quarter of fiscal 1998...* Good trading, Tom In edit mode: Actually, since the 4Q'97 PR dodges the sequential increase issue, there's a chance they may have fallen also, but I need to dig it out of the filings. But if that's the case, and the other assumptions are correct, it would be the 1st time in 4 quarters they experienced a sequential decline, not 8.