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.

Pastimes : The Justa & Lars Honors Bob Brinker Investment Club -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: C_Johnson who wrote (3458)	2/24/1999 6:12:00 PM
From: Justa Werkenstiff	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 15132

Carl: "I am reading a report right now that states Korean cap-ex is estimated to be up 46% y/y which tells me they are filling out their shells with leading edge tools. 46% up sounds nice on the surface but this is off a very low base in '98." Fitzgerald has Samsung at at 1.9B in 1997 and 1.0B in 1998. So based on his number 46% would not get them back to 1997 levels in 1999. I guess 46% sounds plausible. Re: "On the Rambus front there appears to be some caution developing with regards to widescale production. The Rambus impact has been mitigated by the delayed launch of Camino chipset - at least until Q3 of '99 but that is not the whole issue. A few of my contacts are saying that RDRAM shipments in '99 will be well below (60% to 70%) current volume estimates. Production issues, including a need to reduce the die size, and test (of course), seem to be bottlenecking the manufacturing effort. The predictions of RDRAM replacing current DRAM generations may take longer than most anticipate." I guess TER has not fully developed Rambus test yet. Re: "Did you sit in on the Electro Scientific (ESIO) presentation?" No, I missed that one as my staff stayed back at the office <g> and I could not attend every seminar. Guess I will just have to subscribe to Infrastructure <g>. I liked SFAM and IPEC. Best value in combined technology and company fundamentals that I could find with my limited manpower. I am sure there were others. There is room for both AMAT and SFAM as recent order trends have demonstrated. Any opinion on that combination? IPEC seems to have the edge in metal for now. Nice Cu potetnial with NVLS alliance. Selling at a few bucks above pro forma merger book via an IPEC purchase. Will have significant post merger write offs in final FY qtr. Wipe the slate clean in time to post the upturn numbers. Thanks for sharing your views with us stiffs.