| July 10, 1998 |
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July 10, 1998
The Register
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In the wake of stinging losses announced
earlier this week AMD has renegotiated its credit deal
with its banks. On Wednesday the company reported a net
loss of $65 million, having been badly hit by R&D
spend and poor demand for communications products. According
to the company it has met the terms of its loans in
previous quarters, and the renegotiation of terms is
simply a precautionary measure.
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By Lisa DiCarlo
July 9, 1998
PC Week Online
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Intel Corp.'s battle with the Federal
Trade Commission will take a few steps further starting
Friday, when the two meet in a Washington courtroom to
begin the discovery process and to set a date for trial
proceedings. Intel will also file a formal reply to the
FTC's antitrust complaint, which was announced on June 8.
The FTC has charged Intel, of Santa Clara, Calif.,
with anti-competitive practices stemming from earlier
patent infringement lawsuits with Compaq Computer Corp.
and Digital Equipment Corp. and an ongoing dispute with
Intergraph Corp.
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July 10, 1998
Semiconductor Business News
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Advanced Micro Devices Inc. here today
said it will use equipment from Applied Materials Inc. to
develop copper interconnect technology for AMD's
next-generation microprocessors. The Sunnyvale chip
maker said it plans to base its new interconnect
technology on a barrier layer of tantalum nitride (TaN)
and a copper seed layer deposited with Applied Materials'
Electra IMP physical vapor deposition (PVD) technology.
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By Michael Kanellos
July 9, 1998
C/Net
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Chromatic Research is laying off approximately 50
percent of its workforce and will discontinue its Mpact
media processor line, as the company struggles to survive
in the competitive graphics chip arena. The Sunnyvale,
California, company, which specializes in programmable
"media" processors that can handle 3D graphics,
DVD playback, and modem functions, appears to be one of
the first casualties in an industry-wide consolidation
that analysts and even graphics chip executives predicted
earlier this year. The market is overcrowded and few
developers can command prices high enough to offset
expensive development.
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| July 9, 1998 |
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By Larry Barrett
July 8, 1998
Inter@ctive Investor
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Advanced Micro Devices Inc. (NYSE: AMD)
on Wednesday disappointed analysts yet again, posting a
loss of $64.5 million, or 45 cents a share, on sales of
$526 million in its second quarter. AMD shares closed
unchanged at 18 ahead of the earnings report. First
Call consensus had expected the struggling chipmaker to
report a loss of only 20 cents a share in the quarter.
"Weakening demand in the worldwide semiconductor
industry, coupled with continued price pressures on flash
memory products, produced a substantial decline in
revenues from our non-microprocessor business
units," said chief executive W.J. Sanders III in a
prepared release.
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See
Today's Related Stories |
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By Jennifer L. Baljko
July 9, 1998
Electronic Buyer's News
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Kicking off financial reporting season,
Advanced Micro Devices' bigger than expected earnings
loss may foreshadow what's to come in the next few weeks
as tough market conditions plague second quarter results.
Falling well below Wall Street's anticipations, the
Sunnyvale, Calif. chip maker attributed the declines to
weak demand, pricing pressures, Asian financial problems,
and slower product transitions among customers - concerns
that other semiconductor and electronics companies have
cited for their expected lackluster quarter.
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By Michael Kanellos
July 8, 1998
C/Net
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Sales of processors are way up at
Advanced Micro Devices, but that's just part of the
problem. AMD, which announced larger-than-anticipated
losses of 45 cents a share for the second quarter, is
riding a wave of demand for its K6 and K6-2
microprocessors now used in low-cost PCs from vendors
such as Compaq, IBM, and Hewlett-Packard. The K6 family
sales jumped from 1.6 million units last quarter to 2.7
million this quarter, while between 500,000 to 1 million
chips will be added in both the third and fourth
quarters, according to CEO Jerry Sanders.
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By Margaret Kane
July 8, 1998
ZD Net News
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Chromatic Research Inc. said today it
has stopped development of its Mpact architecture, which
was designed to combine multimedia functions on a single
chip. Instead, Chromatic will focus on a "new and
unique" approach to media processing, although it
would not give details of that architecture.
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| Today's Related Stories |
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By Sergio G. Non
July 8, 1998
TechInvestor
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The second quarter was tougher than Wall
Street suspected for Advanced Micro Devices. In results
announced after market close Wednesday, AMD (company
profile) reported a second quarter loss of $64.6 million,
or 45 cents per share, more than double the First Call
consensus of 20 cents per share in losses.
The chip maker said sales were $526 million, down 3
percent from the previous quarter and down 11 percent
from the second quarter of 1997.
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ByWill Wade
July 8, 1998
Semiconductor Business News
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Advanced Micro Devices Inc. here today
reported a net loss of $64.5 million for the second
quarter, as sales declined 3% from the previous quarter
and 11% from the same quarter last year. The only
bright spot in the company's outlook was its line of
microprocessors, which saw 35% sales growth over the
first quarter and unit sales topping 2 million for the
period. However, this is the company's fourth consecutive
losing quarter.
"Our computation products group had an excellent
quarter," noted W.J. (Jerry) Sanders, chairman and
CEO. "However, this could not offset the weaker
demand in our other areas, notably flash memory."
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By Andy Santoni
July 8, 1998
InfoWorld Electric
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Despite substantial growth in sales of
its K6 processors, Advanced Micro Devices on Wednesday
reported a net loss on lower sales for its second
quarter, ended June 28. The company lost $64.56
million, or 45 cents per share, on sales of $526.54
million this year, compared with a net income of $9.97
million, or seven cents per share, on sales of $594.56
million in the same quarter last year.
Sales declined by 3 percent from the immediately prior
quarter, and by 11 percent from the second quarter of
1997.
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July 9, 1998
The Register
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AMD has made a loss of $64.6 million in
its second quarter, but its figures show that sales of
its K6 processors have risen. The company turned over
$526.5 million in the quarter, compared with $594.6
million in the same period a year ago.
While sales of the K6 rose by 26 per cent in the
quarter, a more worrying trend for AMD is that elements
of its core business declined significantly.
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| July 8, 1998 |
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By Michael Kanellos
July 8, 1998
C/Net
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Despite a year featuring new deals with
major computer vendors, increased sales, and improved
manufacturing, chipmaker Advanced Micro Devices is
expected to report its fourth consecutive quarterly loss
today, and hopes of recovery do not seem to be on the
horizon. The loss is expected to be 20 cents a share,
according to a consensus of 24 analysts on First Call.
Estimates range from a loss of 38 cents to a loss of two
cents. A loss of 29 cents per share is expected for the
year.
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By Alexander Wolfe
July 7, 1998
EE Times
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Hidden amid the fanfare surrounding the
launch last month of Intel Corp.'s powerful Xeon
processor are a host of technical surprises that will
pose new challenges for systems designers. As a result,
even seasoned engineers will have to delve into some
unfamiliar territory before they declare their latest
workstations and servers ready for release to
manufacturing. "The Pentium II was designed for a
maximum of two CPUs in a system, while Xeon was designed
for a maximum of four, so you really have to step up some
of the design constraints," explained Gary Thome,
manager of design engineering for Compaq Computer Corp.'s
workstation division. "The other thing is that Xeon
has larger and faster caches, which can draw more
current."
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| July 7, 1998 |
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By Rebecca Sykes
July 6, 1998
InfoWorld Electric
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The OS battle between Windows NT and
various flavors of Unix will not be significantly altered
by the introduction of Intel's 64-bit chip Merced in
mid-2000, according to a number of analysts. Microsoft
is working to make its Windows NT operating system run on
Intel's 64-bit chip, and most Unix vendors have pledged
that their Unix operating systems, some of which have run
for several years on their own proprietary 64-bit chips,
will work on Merced as well.
But Windows NT powered by 64-bit Merced will not
necessarily give Windows the muscle it needs to jump from
its stronghold on desktops and departmental servers into
Unix's traditional space at the high-end, analysts said.
In fact, Merced may instead give the Unix operating
system a slight boost over Windows, because Merced will
bring to Unix the lower-cost benefits of a commodity --
standard industry hardware architecture -- they said.
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By Reuters
July 6, 1998
C/Net
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In October, Canon will start shipments
of semiconductor production equipment capable of making
the most densely packed circuits to date. The new
"stepper," capable of etching semiconductor
circuits finer than 0.18 microns, is designed for volume
production of next-generation 256-megabit DRAM (dynamic
random access memory) chips and also microprocessors on
either 200-mm or 300-mm wafers, Canon said in a
statement. Memory chips holding 256-megabits of data will
pave the way for PCs that come standard with as much as
512 megabytes (MB) of memory, while larger wafers allow
more chips to be packed onto production silicon.
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By Roger C. Lanctot
Juley 6, 1998
Computer Retail Week
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While nearly half of the computers
advertised by national retailers this past weekend had
retail prices of $1,999 or higher, it was the low-cost
300MHz Celeron-based systems that were making waves.
Although Micro Center had the lowest-priced 300MHz
Celeron system at $799 under its PowerSpec brand, Best
Buy had the hottest bundle with an Acer 2856 300MHz
Celeron system with 15" monitor and Canon BJC-250
inkjet printer at $1,199.70. |
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By Kurt Oeler
July 6, 1998
C/Net
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Prices on top-line notebooks sporting
Windows 98 are heading south, led by Intel price cuts and
new Compaq Computer models incorporating processors from
Advanced Micro Devices (AMD). Two fully-loaded Compaq
Presario consumer models using AMD's 266-MHz K6 chip have
dipped below $2,500, while IBM, Gateway, and Compaq are
shipping 266-MHz Pentium II models at prices below
$3,000.
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| July 6, 1998 |
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By Sergio G. Non
July 2, 1998
TechInvestor
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About 1,700 Intel workers will be
temporarily suspended for nine days in July when the
company idles two plants to get rid of excess chips. The
Santa Clara, Calif.-based chip maker said two Oregon
plants will be shut down next month. Facilities that use
older technology -- the two fabs in question are equipped
with 0.5 micron and 0.35 micron processes -- are put in
"warm down" when Intel decides to upgrade them,
spokesman Chuck Mulloy said.
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