Tuesday, March 31, 2009

Vitesse Announces Workforce Reduction

CAMARILLO, Calif. — March 31, 2009 — Vitesse Semiconductor Corporation (Pink Sheets: VTSS.PK) today announced a reduction of approximately 12% in its worldwide workforce. Severance and related charges will be incurred in the second fiscal quarter of 2009.

“We have taken steps to further reduce our operating expenses while fully preserving our investment in R&D and worldwide customer support,” said Chris Gardner, chief executive officer of Vitesse. “While we do see a few positive indicators in the market, we remain cautious about the rest of 2009. It was important to take these actions now in order to achieve our goal to remain cash neutral or better for the fiscal year. We remain committed to introducing at least three new products per quarter and to implementing our strategy to enable Ethernet in Carrier and Enterprise networks.”

MEMSIC 10K

Revenue by end market:
  • Mobile phone: $7.6M (37.9%)
  • Consumer: $5.3M (26.7%)
  • Automotive: $5.6M (28%)
  • Industrial/other: $1.5M (7.4%)
Our net sales decreased by 20.6% to $20.1 million in 2008 from $25.3 million in 2007. This decrease was due to a decrease in the number of units sold, primarily for mobile phone applications, which was partly offset by an increase in unit sales for automotive applications, and to reductions in the average selling price of our products, particularly in the mobile phone and consumer market in China.

Margin decline: "Until recently, our gross profit generally experienced growth in line with increases in our revenue. However, more recently, our gross margin has been decreasing from 67.0% in 2006, to 65.1% in 2007 and 47.9% in 2008. Our gross profit and gross margin are affected by a variety of factors, including average selling prices of our products, our product application mix, prices of wafers, excess and obsolete inventory, pricing by competitors, changes in production yields, and percentage of sales conducted through distributors."

Patent foundation: "As of December 31, 2008, we owned seven patents and had thirteen pending patent applications in the United States, and owned two patents and had twenty-four pending patent applications and assignment in China. As of that date, we also had one issued patent and six pending patent applications in Japan, five pending patent applications in Germany and two pending patent applications filed with the European Patent Office."

Leadis Technology 10K

Customer concentration: "In 2008, our two largest customers, Samsung SDI Corporation and Rikei Corporation, a sales distributor in Japan, accounted for approximately 24% and 38% of our revenue, respectively."

Wafer foundry: "Our foundry suppliers fabricate our display driver products using a customized, high-voltage version of their mature and stable CMOS process technology with feature sizes of 0.15 micron and higher. Our LED and touch controller products are fabricated on mature CMOS processes. Our principal foundry suppliers are Seiko Epson in Japan, and Vanguard International Semiconductor Corporation, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Corporation and United Microelectronics Corporation in Taiwan, but we may use other foundry suppliers in the future. "

Assembly and test: "We currently rely primarily on Chipbond Technology Corporation, International Semiconductor Technology Ltd. and King Yuan Electronics Co., Ltd., each located in Taiwan, and Unisem Group in Malaysia, to assemble and test our products."

Patent foundation and sales: "As of March 15, 2009, we had twenty U.S patents applications pending and had been issued nine U.S. patents. These patent applications and issued patents cover our intellectual property contained in our LED drivers, power management and touch technology products. In January 2009, we sold our display driver business including a number of relevant patents. In February 2009, we sold assets relating to a development-stage power management product, including one issued patent. In March 2009, we sold assets related to our audio products, including a number of patents and pending patents."

Employees: "As of December 31, 2008, we had 161 employees, including 100 in research and development, 23 in operations and 38 in sales, marketing, general and administrative functions. By region, 59 of our employees were located in the United States, 69 in Korea and 33 in Asia and Europe. At the end of 2007, we had 184 employees. Through sales of portions of our business and related transfers of headcount, as well as staff reductions enacted to reduce operating expenses, our headcount declined to 89 as of March 14, 2009."

Business sales: "In January 2009, we sold our display driver assets and transferred certain employees to AsTEK, Inc., a privately-held company located in Korea whose principal is the former general manager of our Korean R&D operation. The total consideration was $3.5 million in the form of a receivable due no later than January 2010 plus $0.5 million of assumed liabilities. We retained rights to most of the current display driver products in production, as well as ownership of our proprietary EpiC™ technology for AM-OLED displays. As a result of this transaction, we have ceased investment in the production, marketing and sale of new display driver integrated circuits.
In February 2009, we sold assets relating to a development-stage power management product. We sold these assets and transferred certain employees to a publicly-traded supplier of analog and mixed-signal semiconductor products. Under the terms of the sale, we will be paid $2.3 million in cash, of which $2 million has been received to date. As a result of this transaction, we ceased development of power management integrated circuits.
In March 2009, we sold assets related to our audio products and transferred certain employees to a publicly-traded supplier of semiconductor products. Under the terms of the sale, we were paid $1.45 million in cash, all of which has been received."



EZchip Technologies 20F

Customer concentration: "Two major tier-1 CESR (carrier Ethernet switches/routers) vendors are building several of their CESR platforms based on EZchip Technologies network processors: Juniper Networks, which accounted for approximately 55% of our 2008 revenues, entered production with NP-2 based products in 2007 and continued to launch additional products that incorporate our NPUs during 2008..........A second major vendor has selected a customized version of NP-3, developed in collaboration with Marvell, for its principal CESR platforms. This CESR vendor accounted for a relatively minor portion of our revenues in 2008 and entered production during the first quarter of 2009 with platforms that incorporate our customized NP-3 processor developed in collaboration with Marvell."

Revenue ramp: "Our 2008 revenues increased 72% to $33.6 million, up from $19.5 million in 2007. This increase in revenues is primarily attributable to increased purchases by a limited number of large NP-2 customers who entered the production stage for networking products that incorporate our network processor chips. Combined sales of NP-2 and NP-3 products accounted for 85% of our 2008 revenues; NP-1 products contributed an additional 13%; and the remaining 2% resulted primarily from the sale of software tools and services."

Patent foundation: "We hold four United States patents, No. 6,532,457, No. 6,594,655, No. 6,625,612 and No. 6,778,534."

Employees: "As of March 30, 2009, we had 116 employees. (84 R&D, 15 Sales & Marketing, 9 Operations, 8 G&A)

Wafer foundry: "Our NP-1c network processors utilize IBM’s 0.11-micron Cu-11 ASIC template. IBM also manufactures our NP-3 line of products using the 90 nanometer process. Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co., or TSMC, manufactures our NP-2 line of products using the 0.13 micron process and the special version of our NP-3 NPU, which we developed with Marvell, and will manufacture our NPA line of products, using the 90 nanometer process......We recently entered into an agreement with Marvell pursuant to which Marvell will be the vendor for our NP-4 network processor. The NP-4 network processor will also be manufactured by TSMC using the 55 nanometer process."

Monday, March 30, 2009

Western Digital acquires SiliconSystems, Inc.

LAKE FOREST, Calif. March 30, 2009 –Western Digital Corp. (NYSE: WDC), a world leader in hard drive storage for computing and consumer electronics applications, today announced that it has completed a $65 million cash acquisition of SiliconSystems, Inc., Aliso Viejo, Calif., a leading supplier of solid-state drives for the embedded systems market.

Since its inception in 2002, SiliconSystems has sold millions of its SiliconDrive® products to meet the high performance, high reliability and multi-year product lifecycle demands of the network-communications, industrial, embedded-computing, medical, military and aerospace markets. These markets accounted for approximately one third of worldwide solid-state drive revenues in 2008. SiliconSystems’ product portfolio includes solid-state drives with SATA, EIDE, PC Card, USB and CF interfaces in 2.5-inch, 1.8-inch, CF and other form factors. SiliconSystems has developed extensive intellectual property to address the stringent embedded systems market requirements to ensure data integrity, eliminate unscheduled downtime, protect application data and software and provide for data security and protection through its patented and patent-pending PowerArmor®, SiSMART®, SolidStor® and SiSecure™ technologies.

WD’s storage industry leadership, worldwide infrastructure, and technical and financial resources will enable further growth in SiliconSystems’ existing markets and customer relationships. SiliconSystems’ intellectual property and technical expertise will provide additional building blocks for future products to address emerging opportunities in WD’s existing markets.

“We are delighted to have the SiliconSystems team join WD,” said John Coyne, president and CEO of WD. “The combination will be modestly accretive to revenue and margins as a result of SiliconSystems’ existing position as a trusted supplier to the well-established $400 million market for embedded solid-state drives. SiliconSystems’ intellectual property and technical expertise will significantly accelerate WD’s solid-state drive development programs for the netbook, client and enterprise markets, providing greater choice for our customers to satisfy all their storage requirements.”

Integration into WD begins immediately, with SiliconSystems now becoming known as the WD Solid-State Storage business unit, complementing WD’s existing Branded Products, Client Storage, Consumer Storage and Enterprise Storage business units.

“WD’s strong balance sheet, sales reach, and operations and logistics capabilities will allow us to greatly accelerate our penetration of our existing markets, while combining our engineering expertise with WD will enable us to develop new solid-state drives to broaden our overall product portfolio and address the emerging applications for solid-state storage in WD’s existing customer base,” said Michael Hajeck, a founder and CEO of SiliconSystems, now senior vice president and general manager of WD’s Solid-State Storage business unit. “We are extremely excited to be joining WD and enabling an even stronger future for our talented team.”

KLA-Tencor 8K - Additional cuts

"On March 30, 2009, KLA-Tencor Corporation in continuation of its efforts to control costs and in response to depressed market conditions, announced that it will reduce the Company's global workforce by approximately 10 percent. This reduction is in addition to the workforce reduction that the Company announced in November 2008. The reduction is one of many cost-saving actions being undertaken by the Company that are designed to help reduce the Company's quarterly non-GAAP operating expenses to a range of $140-145 million per quarter by the end of calendar year 2009."

Thursday, March 26, 2009

Semtech 10K

Customer concentration:
  • Samsung Electronics 18% (up from 8% last fiscal year)
  • Frontek Technology (a distributor) 12%
Revenue by end markets:
  • Computer 18%
  • Communications 18%
  • High-End Consumer 37%
  • Industrial/Other 27%
Revenue by reported segments:
  • Standard Semiconductor 89%
  • Rectifier, Assembly and Other 11%
Employees: "As of January 25, 2009, we had 827 full-time employees. There were 179 employees in research and development, 153 in sales, marketing and field services, and 94 in general, administrative and finance. The remaining employees support operational activities, including product and test engineering, assembly, manufacturing, distribution and quality functions."

Foundry: "For fiscal year 2009, approximately 40% of our silicon in terms of cost of wafers, was supplied by a third-party foundry (unnamed) in China, and this percentage could be even higher in future periods."

Assembly and test: "A majority of our package and test operations are performed by third-party contractors (unnamed) based in Malaysia, Korea, the Philippines and China."

Tuesday, March 24, 2009

Entropic Communications 8K: Staff reductions and closures

"On March 22, 2009, Entropic Communications, Inc.’s (the “Company”) Board of Directors approved a restructuring plan to better position the Company to operate in current market and financial conditions and more closely align operating expenses with revenues. The restructuring plan will result in a worldwide reduction in force of approximately 55 employees, which represents approximately 18% of the Company’s total workforce. Affected employees were notified on March 23 and 24, 2009.
As part of the restructuring plan, the Company will close its locations in Nice, France and Kfar Saba, Israel, and the Company has suspended further development of its advanced network processor architecture and an associated product, which was being staffed primarily out of Kfar Saba. The network processor architecture would have been part of a future product offering from the Company for home networking applications."

Update: Microchip now owns 9.2% of Supertex

"According to the Issuer’s Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q for the Quarter Ended December 27, 2008, filed with the Securities Exchange Commission on February 4, 2009, there were 12,869,095 shares of Common Stock issued and outstanding as of January 30, 2009. Based on such information and including the transactions described in Item 5(c) below, Microchip reports beneficial ownership of 1,187,400 shares of Common Stock, which represents 9.2% of the total number of issued and outstanding shares of Common Stock. Voting and dispositive power with respect to such shares of Common Stock is held solely by Microchip."

Micrel 8K - Standstill Agreement with raider Obrem Capital

On March 19, 2009, the Company entered into a Standstill Agreement with Obrem Capital Offshore Master, LP and Obrem Capital (QP), LP (collectively, the “Obrem Entities”), dated as of March 19, 2009 (the “ Standstill Agreement”). The Obrem Entities are a significant holder of the Company’s Common Stock.
The Standstill Agreement restricts the Obrem Entities from taking certain actions, including, without limitation, financing or participating in any proxy solicitation in connection with any matter, participating in a partnership, limited partnership, syndicate or other group or voting arrangement (with certain limited exceptions), calling a special shareholders’ meeting or introducing a shareholder proposal at a shareholders’ meeting for any purpose, conducting or participating in any type of referendum concerning the Company, its management, Board or business, acquiring beneficial ownership of any additional shares of the Company’s Common Stock (or derivative or other rights in respect of shares of Common Stock), selling or disposing of Common Stock in excess of 300,000 shares (or derivative or other rights in respect thereof) except in limited circumstances, and engaging in certain other actions. The shares of the Common Stock held by the Obrem Entities must be voted, with respect to the election or removal of directors of the Company, in favor of those nominees approved by the Board and against any other nominees and against any proposal to remove the directors of the Company.
The Standstill Agreement is contingent on the Company’s continuing efforts at improving operating margin consistent with economic conditions, repurchase of shares and paying a dividend as cash allows, staffing its board of directors with qualified board members and having a board of six members with five independent directors. While the Standstill Agreement is conditioned upon the Company making efforts, the Company is not obligated to take any of these actions.
The Standstill Agreement terminates upon the earliest to occur of (i) March 24, 2010, (ii) the date on which the Obrem Entities and their affiliates beneficially own less than 5% of the Company’s then-outstanding Common Stock, (iii) the material and uncured breach of any material provision of the Standstill Agreement by the Company, (iv) the acquisition of a majority of the outstanding shares of Common Stock by a person or group that is not affiliated with the Obrem Entities, (v) the entry by the Company into any merger, acquisition transaction or other business combination involving all or substantially all of the Company’s assets or properties or (vi) certain bankruptcy proceedings, a general assignment for the benefit of creditors, or the application for the appointment of, or the appointment of a trustee or other custodian for the Company or all or substantially all of the Company’s property under any state or federal bankruptcy or insolvency law.

Friday, March 20, 2009

Silicon Storage Technology 10K

Wafer foundry and die sort: "During 2008, our major wafer fabrication foundries were TSMC, Grace, HHNEC and Seiko-Epson. In 2008, wafer sort, which is the process of testing individual die on silicon wafer, was performed at King Yuan Electronics Company, Limited, or KYE, Lingsen, HHNEC, Sanyo, Seiko-Epson and TSMC...........In 2001 and 2004, we invested an aggregate of $83.2 million in GSMC, a Cayman Islands company. Bing Yeh, our President, CEO and Chairman of our Board of Directors, is also a member of GSMC’s board of directors. GSMC has a wholly owned subsidiary, Shanghai Grace Semiconductor Manufacturing Corporation, or Grace, which is a wafer foundry company with operations in Shanghai, China. Grace began to manufacture our products in late 2003."

Assembly and test: "The subcontractors with the largest amount of our activity were KYE, Lingsen, and Powertech Technology, Incorporated, or PTI. We hold equity investments in three subcontractors: Apacer Technology, Inc., or Apacer, KYE and PTI."

Employees: "As of December 31, 2008, we employed 614 individuals on a full-time basis, 282 of whom reside in the United States. Of these 614 employees, 92 were employed in manufacturing support, 286 in engineering, 112 in sales and marketing and 124 in administration, finance and information technology."

Patent foundation: "As of December 31, 2008, we held 261 patents in the United States relating to certain aspects of our products and processes......."

Recent legal action: "On or about July 13, 2007, a patent infringement suit was brought by OPTi Inc. in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Texas alleging infringement of two United State patents related to a “Compact ISA-bus Interface”. The plaintiff sought a permanent injunction, and damages for alleged past infringement, as well as any other relief the court may grant that is just and proper. On January 1, 2009, OPTi and SST resolved our differences and the suit was dismissed with prejudice."

Actel 10K

Wafer foundry and geometries:
  • "Chartered in Singapore using 0.45- and 0.35-micron design rules
  • Infineon in Germany using 0.25- and 0.13-micron design rules
  • Panasonic (formerly Matsushita) in Japan using 1.0-, 0.9-, 0.8- and 0.25-micron design rules
  • UMC in Taiwan using 0.25/0.22-, 0.15-, and 0.13-micron and 65nm design rules
  • Winbond in Taiwan using 0.8- and 0.45-micron design rules
In November 2008, UMC and Actel jointly announced that the two companies have collaborated in the production of Actel’s next generation Flash-based FPGAs. The chips will be manufactured on UMC’s 65nm low leakage process, and will take advantage of the foundry’s 65nm embedded Flash (“eFlash”) technology."

Patent foundation: "As of February 25, 2009, we held more than 390 United States patents and had applications pending for approximately 120 additional United States patents. We also held more than 100 foreign patents and had applications pending for more than 90 patents outside the United States."

Employees: "At the end of 2008, we had 550 full-time employees, including 142 in marketing, sales, and customer support; 226 in engineering and research and development; 143 in operations; and 39 in administration and finance. This compares with 584 full-time employees at the end of 2007, a decrease of 6%."

Thursday, March 19, 2009

Gennum acquires Tundra Semiconductor

Burlington, Ontario and Ottawa, Ontario– March 19, 2009 – Gennum Corporation (TSX: GND ) and Tundra Semiconductor Corporation (TSX: TUN ) today announced they have entered into a definitive agreement providing for the acquisition by Gennum of all of the issued and outstanding shares of Tundra, a supplier of system interconnect products and intellectual property (IP) to the world’s leading communications, computing and storage companies. The transaction, which is valued at approximately Cdn$86 million, adds new digital switch and bridge products and functionality to Gennum and builds on Gennum’s growth strategy of extending its high-speed signal integrity expertise and solutions to a broader set of markets.

The transaction is expected to result in a number of benefits for the combined business, including the following:

  • Added scale and increased market presence in an expanded, US$1.9 billion total addressable market
  • A strongly positioned business in signal integrity, bridges and switches using RapidIO®, VME, SDI and HDMI standards, as well as in PCI Express® (PCIe)
  • Increased global customer base and stronger existing customer penetration with broadened product portfolio
  • Expanded sales and distribution network in key growth regions such as Asia and China
  • Increased research and development capacity to develop more differentiated new products faster
  • Expected cash synergies of approximately US$10 million
  • Based on synergies, expected to be accretive this fiscal year, excluding one-time costs
  • Strong cash position on completion of the transaction
The purchase price payable by Gennum for each Tundra common share will be, at the election of the holder, Cdn$4.43 in cash or 1.1575 common shares of Gennum (“Gennum Shares”) or a combination thereof, subject to pro ration as discussed below. Based on 19,326,053 Tundra current outstanding common shares, in aggregate, a total of $55 million cash and 8.0 million common shares of Gennum will be issued to holders of Tundra common shares. Based on Gennum’s five day volume weighted average share price on the Toronto Stock Exchange ending on March 18, the total consideration values Tundra at Cdn$4.43 per share, a 48% premium to Tundra’s volume weighted average share price on the Toronto Stock Exchange over the same period.

Wednesday, March 18, 2009

AuthenTec 10K

Business basis: "Since our inception in 1998, we have shipped over 44 million (fingerprint) sensors which have been integrated into over 250 different models of laptops, desktops and PC peripherals as well as over 9 million mobile phones. In response to increased demand, we shipped over 17.7 million sensor units in 2008, a 39% increase over the 12.7 million sensor units we shipped in 2007. Correspondingly, our revenue increased over the same period from $52.3 million in 2007 to $63.9 million in 2008, a 22% increase."

Customer concentration: " In fiscal 2008, Hewlett-Packard Company, Fujitsu Ltd. and Lenovo Group Ltd., either directly or through their suppliers, accounted for 41%, 14% and 11%, respectively, of our revenue in 2008. Our top five end customers accounted for 78% of our revenue in fiscal 2008 and 85% of our revenue in fiscal 2007. "

Wafer foundry: "We currently outsource most of our semiconductor fabrication to TSMC."

Wafer bumping: "We outsource most of the wafer gold bumping of our products to Chipbond in Taiwan....."

Assembly and test: "We outsource all assembly and testing of our products to subcontractors, Signetics in South Korea and ChipMOS in Taiwan."

Employees: "As of January 2, 2009, we had 130 full-time employees, including 83 in research and development, five in operations, 26 in sales and marketing and 16 in general and administrative functions."

Patent foundation: "Our proprietary technologies are protected by 47 issued U.S. patents and 27 U.S. patent applications."

Tuesday, March 17, 2009

Ramtron Announces Restructuring and Cost Reductions

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--U.S. semiconductor maker Ramtron International Corporation (Nasdaq: RMTR), the leading developer and supplier of nonvolatile ferroelectric random access memory (F-RAM) and integrated semiconductor products, today announced that it has initiated restructuring and cost reduction actions to strengthen its operation during the current economic environment and position the company to execute on its key strategic objectives. As a result of the actions, the company expects to reduce its previously projected 2009 costs and operating expenses, excluding impairment related charges, by approximately $5.1 million. In connection with the actions, Ramtron expects to record charges totaling $5.8 million during the first half of 2009, of which most will be taken during the first quarter. Approximately $4.8 million of the charges will be non-cash impairments of goodwill, long-term assets, and purchased IP associated with the company’s Canadian operation. The remaining $1 million is related to severance costs arising from a 17% reduction in the company’s workforce. In addition, the company has reduced salaries for all employees by 5% to 12%, eliminated variable compensation accruals for 2009, and taken other actions to reduce operating expenses. After the workforce reduction, the company employs 102 people throughout its worldwide operation. “This restructuring preserves Ramtron’s financial stability and operational flexibility while we work toward establishing a new foundry at IBM, which is a key objective intended to enhance new product development and lower manufacturing costs,” said Bill Staunton, Ramtron’s CEO. “In light of the uncertainty surrounding current economic conditions, we decided to take pre-emptive steps to align the company’s cost structure with a very conservative annual revenue level that is projected lower than our previously stated 2009 annual revenue guidance.”

Axcelis Technologies NT 10K (Late Filing Notice)

"Axcelis Technologies, Inc. (the “Company”) is unable to file its Annual Report on Form 10-K for the period ended December 31, 2008 within the prescribed time period without unreasonable effort and expense because extra time is needed to determine the amount by which the Company’s long-lived assets and goodwill have been impaired. In connection with the preparation of the financial statements for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2008, and following discussions with the Audit Committee, management concluded that, due to the continuing downturn in the semiconductor industry and the global economy, the Company’s long-lived assets and goodwill have been impaired........The Company expects to file the Form 10-K on or before March 31, 2009, the fifteenth calendar day following the prescribed due date."

Silicon Storage Technology NT 10K (Late Filing Notice)

"Silicon Storage Technology, Inc. (“SST”) is in the process of completing an impairment analysis of its investment in Grace Semiconductor Manufacturing Corporation, a privately held Cayman Islands Company (“GSMC”). On February 4, 2009 SST reported a $5.6 million impairment charge related to it investment in GSMC. Subsequent to the release of its 2008 financial results on February 4, 2009, additional information was obtained by SST which will impact the impairment analysis and increase the amount of the impairment charge. As a result of the ongoing impairment analysis, SST is currently unable to file its Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2008 by the required filing date of March 16, 2009 and currently anticipates that it will be filed on or before the fifteenth calendar day following the required due date in accordance with Rule 12b-25."

Wave Systems 10K

Product, market and customer concentration: "Of the total revenue realized for the years ended December 31, 2008 and 2007, 100% was derived from Wave's EMBASSY computer security products and services." (80% of sales to Dell) "Wave's products are unique because they support cross platform interoperability for the currently available TPM chips from Nuvoton (formerly Winbond), Broadcom, Atmel, Infineon and ST Microsystems, and have been certified and/or approved for usage on TPM-based platforms shipped by Dell, Intel, Acer, Fujitsu, Lenovo, NEC and HP."

Patent foundation: "Wave has been issued twelve (12) United States patents relating to encryption and to our proprietary EMBASSY and Wave Commerce technology. We also have seven (7) patents pending before the United States Patent Office. In addition, we have two (2) foreign patents and twenty-nine (29) pending foreign patent applications."

Employees: "As of December 31, 2008, we employed ninety (90) full-time employees, forty-five (45) of whom were involved in sales, marketing and administration and forty-five (45) of whom were involved in research and development (including six (6) employed by Wavexpress, three (3) of whom were in sales, marketing and administration and three (3) of whom were involved in research and development). As of December 31, 2008, we retained the services of three (3) full-time consultants."

Monday, March 16, 2009

CEVA 10K

Market share: "In 2008, analyst firm Gartner Inc. reported CEVA’s share of the licensable DSP market at 61%."

Customers and end market brands: "Our technologies are widely licensed and power some of the world’s leading consumer electronics and semiconductor companies, including Broadcom, Ericsson, Freescale, Infineon, InterDigital, Intersil, Marvell, Mediatek, Mindspeed, NXP, RadioFrame Networks, Renesas, Samsung, Sharp, Solomon Systech, Sony, Spreadtrum, ST Wireless, STMicroelectronics, Sunplus, Thomson, VIA Telecom and Zoran.......In 2008, CEVA’s licensees shipped 307 million CEVA-powered chipsets targeted for a wide range of diverse end markets, an increase of 36% over 2007 shipments of 227 million chipsets. To date, over one billion CEVA-powered chipsets have been deployed by the world’s top consumer electronics brands, including ASUS, Amoi, Casio, Dell, Fujitsu, Haier, i-mate, Lenovo, LG Electronics, Nintendo, Nokia, Palm, Panasonic, Philips, Pioneer, Samsung, Sharp, Sony, Sony Ericsson, Toshiba and ZTE."

Patent foundation: "Our patents relate to our DSP cores, DSP-based subsystems and application-specific platform technologies. As of December 31, 2008, we hold 40 patents in the United States and seven patents in the EME (Europe and Middle East) region with expiration dates between 2013 and 2022. In addition, as of December 31, 2008, we have 11 patent applications pending in the United States, one pending patent application in Canada, eight pending patent applications in the EME region and three pending patent applications in Asia Pacific (APAC)."


Employees:
  • Total 187
  • R&D 128
  • Sales and marketing 20
  • Technical support 15
  • Administration 24

Pixelworks 10K

Revenue by segment for year ending 12/31/2008:
  • Digital projector $52.9M (down 10%)
  • Advanced television $11.2M (down 44%)
  • Advanced media processor $11.3M (down 30%)
  • LCD monitor, panel and other $9.7M (down 15%)

Customer concentration:
"Revenue attributable to our top five end customers represented 55%, 47% and 39% of revenue for the years ended December 31, 2008, 2007 and 2006, respectively. End customers include customers who purchase directly from us as well as customers who purchase products indirectly through distributors and manufacturers’ representatives. During 2008, we sold product directly to Seiko Epson Corporation who represented 24% of revenue for the year ended December 31, 2008 and accounted for 20% of accounts receivable at December 31, 2008. Revenue attributable to Seiko Epson Corporation was 21% and 15% of revenue for the years ended December 31, 2007 and 2006, respectively. No other end customer accounted for more than 10% of revenue during the years ended December 31, 2008, 2007 and 2006."

Wafer foundry:
"Our wafers are fabricated by Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation (“SMIC”), Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Corporation and Toshiba Corporation."

Employees:
"As of December 31, 2008, we had a total of 229 employees comprised of 130 in engineering; 48 in sales and marketing, of which 18 are field application engineers and 30 are sales and marketing staff; 18 in operations; and 33 in administration, including finance, information technology, human resources and general administration. Of the 229 employees, 50 were located in the United States as of December 31, 2008."

Patent foundation: "Currently, we hold 90 patents and have 64 patent applications pending, which relate generally to improvements in the visual display of digital image data including, but not limited to, improvements in image scaling, image correction, automatic image optimization and video signal processing for digital displays."

Mosys 10K

Customers concentration (IP sales): "Our overall revenue has been highly concentrated, with a few customers accounting for a significant percentage of our total revenue. For the year ended December 31, 2008, NEC and TSMC represented 55% and 13% of total revenue, respectively.......We have license agreements with many companies, including, but not limited to, Agilent Technologies, Analog Devices, Inc., Broadcom Corporation, Dialog Semiconductor, eSilicon Corporation, Fujitsu, Himax Technologies, Ltd., Hitachi, Ltd., Kawasaki Micoroelectronics, Inc., Keyasic Ltd., LG Electronics, Inc., LSI Logic Corporation, Marvell Semiconductor, Inc., Matsushita Communication Industrial Co., Ltd., National Semiconductor Corporation, NEC, Nexuschips Co. Ltd., Open-Silicon, Inc., Orise Technology Co. Inc., Philips Semiconductors, Inc., Pixelworks, Inc., Pixim, Inc., Progate Group Corporation, Realtek Semiconductor Corporation, Sicon Semiconductor AB, Silterra, SMIC, Sanyo Electric Co., Ltd., Sony Corporation, TSMC, UMC, Via Technologies, Inc., and Yamaha Corporation."

Employees: "As of December 31, 2008, we had 191 employees, consisting of 164 in research and development and engineering, 15 in sales and marketing and 12 in finance and administration. Under our plan to exit the analog/mixed-signal product lines, we expect to eliminate 90 research and development and engineering positions in the first half of 2009. "

Patent foundation: "As of December 31, 2008, we held approximately 95 U.S. and approximately 48 foreign patents on various aspects of our memory technology, with expiration dates ranging from 2012 to 2027. We currently have approximately 64 pending patent applications in the U.S. and abroad."

Saturday, March 14, 2009

Lattice 10K

Wafer foundry: "We source silicon wafers from our foundry partners, Fujitsu in Japan, Seiko Epson Corporation (“Seiko Epson”) in Japan, United Microelectronics Corporation (“UMC”) in Taiwan and Chartered Semiconductor Manufacturing, Ltd. (“Chartered Semiconductor”) in Singapore, pursuant to agreements with each company and their respective affiliates."

Employees: "At January 3, 2009, we had 753 full-time employees."

Intellon 10K

Revenue model: "Although we commenced operations in 1989, we recently have experienced a period of significant growth and expansion. Our revenue grew to $75.4 million for 2008 from $52.3 million for 2007. In addition, our operating expenses increased to $32.3 million for 2008 from $31.5 million for 2007. ......... As of December 31, 2008, we had shipped more than 33.8 million powerline communications ICs, including 26.0 million HomePlug-based ICs that have been integrated into adapters, set-top boxes and other commercial applications. We shipped over 11.9 million powerline communication ICs in 2008, a 55% increase over shipments of more than 7.7 million powerline communications ICs in 2007. Our HomePlug-based ICs represented approximately 96% of our revenue for the year ended December 31, 2008"

Customer concentration:
"Our ICs are currently incorporated into products by over 50 OEMs, including devolo AG, Aztech Systems Ltd., NETGEAR Inc., LEA S.A.S., and H3C Technologies Co. Limited and used by more than 45 service providers, including Free, Dish Network, France Telecom SA, Telecom Italia and AT&T. In 2008, Free, a service provider, devolo AG, an OEM, and Lumax International Corporation, a distributor, accounted for approximately 21%, 19% and 10% of our revenue, respectively."

Wafer foundry: "We currently use two wafer foundry companies for our ICs. For our HomePlug-based ICs, we use United Microelectronics Corporation in Taiwan and Chartered Semiconductor Manufacturing, Ltd in Singapore. We have in production HomePlug-based ICs using 65 nanometer, 90 nanometer, 150 nanometer and 180 nanometer process geometries for wafer production. We also use Chartered Semiconductor Manufacturing, Ltd. and On Semiconductor in the U.S. for our command and control ICs, using 0.5 micron and 1.5 micron processes, respectively. We use complementary metal oxide semiconductor (CMOS) manufacturing process technology for our ICs."

Assembly and test: "The assembly and testing of our products are performed by multiple principal subcontractors, which are Orient Semiconductor Electronics Ltd. (OSE) in Taiwan, Signetics in the Republic of Korea, Integra Technologies LLC in the U.S., ON Semiconductor in the Philippines and Advanced Semiconductor Engineering, Inc. in Taiwan. "

Employees: "As of December 31, 2008, we employed 128 full-time employees, including 64 in research and development, 35 in sales and marketing, 8 in operations and 21 in general and administration."

Friday, March 13, 2009

Microchip acquires 6.1% of Supertex in last 60 days

From today's Supertex 13D filing: "An aggregate of 594,300 shares of Common Stock reported in this Schedule 13D as being beneficially owned by Microchip were acquired in open market purchases. The remaining aggregate of 191,900 shares were acquired pursuant to the exercise of put options sold by Microchip. The aggregate purchase price for the shares of Common Stock purchased by Microchip in open market purchases and pursuant to the exercise of put options was $16.9 million. The source of funding for the purchases of such shares was the general working capital of Microchip........According to the Issuer’s Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q for the Quarter Ended December 27, 2008, filed with the Securities Exchange Commission on February 4, 2009, there were 12,869,095 shares of Common Stock issued and outstanding as of January 30, 2009. Based on such information and including the transactions described in Item 5(c) below, Microchip reports beneficial ownership of 786,200 shares of Common Stock, which represents 6.1% of the total number of issued and outstanding shares of Common Stock. Voting and dispositive power with respect to such shares of Common Stock is held solely by Microchip."

Nvidia 10K

Graphics processor market share: "Our share of the standalone desktop GPU category decreased from 64% to 63% in fiscal year 2009, according to the December 2007 and December 2008 PC Graphics Report from Mercury Research, respectively. Our share of the standalone notebook category decreased from 75% to 63%, according to the December 2007 and December 2008 PC Graphics Report from Mercury Research, respectively."

Gross margin collapse: "During the fourth quarter of fiscal year 2009, our gross margin declined to 29.4% as compared to 45.7% during the fourth quarter of fiscal year 2008 and decreased from 41.0% from the third quarter of fiscal year 2009."

Microsoft stock rights: "On March 5, 2000, we entered into an agreement with Microsoft in which we agreed to develop and sell graphics chips and to license certain technology to Microsoft and its licensees for use in the Xbox. Under the agreement, if an individual or corporation makes an offer to purchase shares equal to or greater than 30% of the outstanding shares of our common stock, Microsoft may have first and last rights of refusal to purchase the stock. The Microsoft provision and the other factors listed above could also delay or prevent a change in control of NVIDIA."

Recent legal activity: "On February 17, 2009, Intel Corporation filed suit against NVIDIA Corporation, seeking declaratory and injunctive relief relating to a licensing agreement that the parties signed in 2004. The lawsuit was filed in Delaware Chancery Court. Intel seeks an order from the Court declaring that the license does not extend to certain future NVIDIA chipset products, and enjoining NVIDIA from stating that it has licensing rights for these products. The lawsuit seeks no damages from NVIDIA. If Intel successfully obtains such a court order, we could be unable to sell our MCP products for use with Intel processors and our competitive position would be harmed. NVIDIA’s response to the Intel complaint is currently due on March 23, 2009." (Nvidia's cases are far too numerous to detail here, but include landlord and trustee actions relating to 3dfx's bankruptcy, SEC cases, DOJ anti-trust cases, Rambus patent infringement claims and product liability claims resulting from product reliability issues.)

Customer concentration: "Sales to our largest customer, Hewlett-Packard Company, accounted for 11% of our total revenue for fiscal year 2009."

Foundry, assembly and test: "We utilize industry-leading suppliers, such as Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Corporation, or TSMC, United Microelectronics Corporation, or UMC, Chartered Semiconductor Manufacturing, or Chartered, Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation, or SMIC, and Austria Micro Systems, or AMS to produce our semiconductor wafers. We then utilize independent subcontractors, such as Advanced Semiconductor Engineering, or ASE, Amkor Technology, or Amkor, JSI Logistics Ltd., or JSI, King Yuan Electronics Co., Ltd, or KYEC, Siliconware Precision Industries Company Ltd., or SPIL, and STATS ChipPAC Incorporated, or ChipPAC, to perform assembly, testing and packaging of most of our products.......Our current product families are manufactured using 0.15 micron, 0.14 micron, 0.13 micron, 0.11 micron, 90 nanometer, 65 nanometer and 55 nanometer process technologies."

Packaging reliability problem: ".....For example, in July 2008, we recorded a $196.0 million charge against cost of revenue to cover anticipated customer warranty, repair, return, replacement and other associated costs arising from a weak die/packaging material set in certain versions of our previous generation MCP and GPU products used in notebook systems."

Employees: "As of January 25, 2009 we had 5,420 employees, 3,772 of whom were engaged in research and development and 1,648 of whom were engaged in sales, marketing, operations and administrative positions."

Mellanox Technologies 10K

View of the InfiniBand market: "Based on data provided by IDC in April 2008 in a report called “Worldwide InfiniBand 2007-2011 Forecast Update,” the number of InfiniBand HCAs expected to ship to the market will increase at a 51.5% compound annual growth rate (CAGR) from 124,000 in 2006 to 991,000 in 2011. IDC also forecasts that the number of InfiniBand switch ports expected to ship to the market will increase at a 54.5% CAGR from 177,000 ports in 2006 to 1.56 million ports in 2011. IDC credits the growth of InfiniBand usage to increasing deployment in HPC, scale-out database, shared virtualized I/O, and financial services environments."

Customer concentration: "We sold products to more than 257 customers worldwide in the year ended December 31, 2008, many of whom are at the evaluation stage of their product development. We currently anticipate that several of these evaluations will result in increased orders for our products as they move into the production stage. In the year ended December 31, 2008, sales to Hewlett-Packard accounted for 19% of our total revenues, sales to Sun accounted for 17% of our total revenues and sales to QLogic Corporation accounted for 11% of our total revenues."

Foundry, assembly and test: "We use Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, or TSMC, to manufacture and Advanced Semiconductor Engineering, or ASE, to assemble, package and production test our IC products. We use Flextronics to manufacture our standard adapter card products and custom adapter cards and switch systems."

Employees: "As of December 31, 2008, we had 262 full-time employees and 41 part-time employees located in the United States and Israel, including 215 in research and development, 39 in sales and marketing, 28 in general and administrative and 21 in operations. Of our 262 full-time employees, 217 are located in Israel."

Patent foundation: "As of December 31, 2008, we had 15 issued patents and 25 patent applications pending in the United States., 5 issued patents in Taiwan and 1 issued patent and 5 applications pending in Israel, each of which covers aspects of the technology in our products."

IP licensed from Vitesse: "In addition to our own IP, we also rely on third-party technologies for the development of our interconnect IC products. Pursuant to a license agreement dated September 10, 2001, Vitesse Semiconductor Corporation, or Vitesse, a provider of high-speed physical layer semiconductor products for the communications market, granted us a non-exclusive, worldwide, perpetual right and license to use and incorporate into our InfiniBand products Vitesse’s 2.5Gb/s SerDes macro cell implemented in TSMC’s 0.18 micron Complementary Metal-Oxide Semiconductor, or CMOS, processes. We agreed only to use Vitesse’s technology licensed under the agreement for integrated SerDes applications. In exchange for this license, we agreed to pay a royalty to Vitesse based on the total number of devices sold by us that use Vitesse’s technology. In February 2008, Vitesse discharged us from paying royalty payments due under this agreement."

Thursday, March 12, 2009

Ikanos Communications 10K

Customer concentration: "In 2008, NEC Corporation accounted for 25%, Sagem Communications accounted for 21%, Paltek Corporation accounted for 23%, and Alcatel-Lucent accounted for 11% of our revenue.....the list of our OEM customers who have purchased at least $1.0 million of our products directly from us, through a CM or a distributor for the year ended December 28, 2008.: Alcatel-Lucent, Corecess, Inc, Dasan Networks, Inc., Motorola, Inc., Millinet Co., Ltd., NEC Corporation, Sagem Communications, Sumitomo Electronic Industries, Ltd., Thomson Telecom SPA, Ubiquoss ISP, ZyXEL."

Employees: "December 28, 2008, we had 194 employees engaged in research and development, of which 100 are employed in Bangalore and Hyderabad, India, 79 in North America and 15 in rest of world."

Wafer foundry: "We currently outsource all semiconductor wafer manufacturing to Austriamicrosystems AG, NXP Semiconductors, Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation, Silterra Malaysia Sdn Bhd., Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company and Tower Semiconductor Ltd."

Assembly and test: "We outsource all product packaging and all testing requirements for these products to several assembly and test subcontractors, including Advanced Semiconductor Engineering, Inc. in Taiwan and Malaysia, Global Testing Corporation in Taiwan STATSChipPAC Ltd. in Singapore and United Test and Assembly Center Ltd. in Singapore."

Patent foundation: "As of December 28, 2008, we held a total of 95 issued patents in the U.S. and abroad; we also had a number of provisional patents and applications pending."

Employees: "As of December 28, 2008, we had a total of 290 full-time employees, of whom 194 were involved in research and development, 7 in operations, and 89 in sales, marketing, finance and administration. "

TSMC 6K - February Sales down 59% Y/Y

Hsinchu, Taiwan, R.O.C. — March 10, 2009 — TSMC (TAIEX: 2330, NYSE: TSM) today announced its net sales for February 2009: on an unconsolidated basis, sales were approximately NT$11.50 billion, a decrease of 7.5 percent from January 2009 and a decrease of 59.5 percent from February 2008. Revenues for January through February 2009 totaled NT$23.94 billion, a decrease of 59.2 percent compared to the same period in 2008.

Wednesday, March 11, 2009

Quicklogic 10K

Wafer foundry and geometries: "We currently outsource our wafer manufacturing, primarily to TSMC and Tower. TSMC manufactures our pASIC 3, QuickRAM and certain QuickPCI products using a four-layer metal, 0.35 micron complementary metal oxide semiconductor, or CMOS, process. TSMC also manufactures our Eclipse and other mature products using a five-layer metal, 0.25 micron CMOS process on eight-inch wafers....Tower manufactures our new products, and will manufacture new products currently under development, using a six-layer metal, 0.18 micron CMOS process incorporating our ViaLink technology. We have invested $21.3 million in Tower as part of Tower's efforts to build and equip their wafer fabrication facility."

Assembly and test: "We outsource our product packaging, testing and programming primarily to Amkor Technology, Inc and Unisem (M) Berhard."

Employees: "As of December 28, 2008, we had a total of 88 employees worldwide."

Techwell 10K

Revenue and trend by product line: "Revenues were $67.6 million in 2008 and $59.9 million in 2007, an increase of 13% in 2008 over 2007. Revenues from our security surveillance products were $52.7 million an increase of approximately $12.1 million, or 30%, in 2008 compared to 2007, primarily as a result of the increase in sales of our integrated four-in-one security surveillance products. Revenues from our LCD display products were $7.1 million, an increase of approximately $1.0 million, or 17%, in 2008 compared to 2007, primarily as a result of an increase in demand in the automotive market for vehicles with an in-car LCD display that utilize our products. Revenues from our video decoder products were $7.6 million, a decrease of approximately $4.7 million, or 38%, in 2008 compared to 2007, primarily as a result of a decrease in demand for our video decoders. Additionally, sales of our video decoders have also been impacted by the shift to application-specific products specifically designed for the security surveillance and automotive infotainment markets. Other revenues decreased to $0.3 million in 2008 as compared to $1.0 million in 2007, primarily as a result of decreased sales of our PCI video decoder products."

Wafer foundry:
"We currently outsource our semiconductor manufacturing primarily to Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, or TSMC."

Assembly and test: "We outsource all packaging and testing of our products to assembly and test subcontractors, primarily to Advanced Semiconductor Engineering, Inc., or ASE, in Taiwan."

Employees: "As of December 31, 2008, we employed 165 full-time employees, including 78 in research and development, 52 in sales, marketing and support, 17 in operations and 18 in general and administration. "

Patent foundation: "As of December 31, 2008, we had two issued patents in the United States and five patent applications pending in the United States and two applications pending in foreign jurisdictions."

National Semiconductor 8K - Cutting staff and executive pay

"On March 10, 2009, the Company’s Board of Directors approved the commencement of actions to align expenses with current and projected revenues. As a result, the Company will reduce the size of its global workforce by approximately 850 in areas such as product lines, sales and marketing, manufacturing and support functions. The majority of these affected employees will depart before the end of the fourth quarter of fiscal 2009. In addition, the Company intends to further reduce headcount by approximately 875 over the next 12-24 months through the eventual closure of the Company’s wafer fabrication facility in Arlington, Texas and the Company’s assembly and test plant in Suzhou, China. As a result of these actions, the Company expects to incur total charges of approximately $160 million to $180 million, primarily for severance, asset impairment and other exit-related costs, of which $130 million to $145 million are expected to be recorded in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2009. Severance costs will primarily be incurred in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2009 upon notification of all affected employees and are expected to be approximately $65 million to $70 million; substantially all of these severance costs will consist of cash expenditures. Charges related to asset write offs are expected to be approximately $63 million to $70 million. Other exit-related costs relate to closure and transfer activities which are expected to be $32 million to $40 million, substantially all of these other exit-related costs are expected to result in cash expenditures. On March 11, 2009 the Compensation Committee of the Board of Directors approved an arrangement temporarily reducing the base salaries of each of the Company’s executive officers during the fourth quarter fiscal 2009 and first quarter fiscal 2010. As a result, the gross bi-weekly salary of Messrs. Halla and Macleod will be reduced during that period by 25% and 15%, respectively, and that of each other executive officer by 10%."

Friday, March 6, 2009

PLX Technology 10K

Wafer foundy, assembly and test: "Currently, our products are primarily being fabricated, assembled or tested by AMD, Advanced Semiconductor Engineering, Fujitsu, FST, NEC, Seiko-Epson Semiconductor, STATS ChipPAC Ltd., Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Corporation and UMC."

Employees:
"As of December 31, 2008, we employed a total of 158 full-time employees, including 71 engaged in research and development, 57 engaged in sales and marketing, 3 engaged in manufacturing operations and 27 engaged in general administration activities."

Oxford acquisition:
"On December 15, 2008, we signed a definitive agreement to acquire all of the outstanding shares of capital stock of Oxford, a privately held fabless provider of industry-leading silicon and software for the SOHO storage markets. The acquisition closed on January 2, 2009.........As a part of the Merger Agreement, the Company acquired all of the outstanding shares of capital stock of Oxford in exchange for 5,600,000 shares of common stock of PLX and a promissory note in the principal amount of $14,200,000 (the “Note”) that will be satisfied by either (i) the issuance of an additional 3,400,000 shares of common stock of PLX upon approval of PLX’s stockholders, or (ii) the repayment of the principal amount of the Note if such stockholder approval is not obtained by June 30, 2009.........The Company had a layoff in the first quarter of 2009 in connection with the acquisition of Oxford. The estimated severance cost is approximately $2.0 million."

Thursday, March 5, 2009

Marvell 8K - Cutting 850 positions or 15%

"On March 2, 2009, Marvell’s board of directors approved the implementation of a plan to lower the overall costs and expenses of Marvell in response to the deteriorating economic environment. As a result of this plan and combined with certain cost reduction measures taken in December 2008 and January 2009, Marvell plans to reduce its global workforce by approximately 15 percent, or approximately 850 employees. Marvell estimates that the restructuring charges associated with the reduction in force and consolidation of facilities specifically identified to date will be approximately $20 million, including approximately $14 million related to severance and other employee benefit payments and approximately $6 million related to facility consolidation. This estimate includes restructuring charges recorded in the fiscal fourth quarter of 2009 of approximately $9.7 million, comprised of $6.7 million of severance and other employee benefit payments and $3.0 million of facilities consolidation."

LTX-Credence 8K - $54M loss

"MILPITAS, Calif., March 4, 2009 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- LTX-Credence Corporation (Nasdaq:LTXC), a global provider of focused, cost-optimized ATE solutions, today announced financial results for its 2009 second fiscal quarter ended January 31, 2009.

Sales for the quarter were $30,401,000. Net loss for the quarter was $(54,546,000), or $(0.43) per share on a GAAP basis. Excluding the net impact of special items totaling $21,075,000, and amortization of purchased intangibles of $4,446,000, the net loss for the quarter was $(29,025,000), or $(0.23) per share on a non-GAAP basis.

Dave Tacelli, chief executive officer and president, commented, "During our second fiscal quarter, business conditions deteriorated even further than expected as evidenced by our preannouncement. While it appears that LTX-Credence may have reached a cycle bottom, it's difficult to predict when there will be consistent improvement in the overall business environment. During this difficult period, we are focused on developing the right products to drive market share growth and reducing our break-even to drive cross-cycle profitability."

Third Quarter Fiscal 2009 Outlook

For the quarter ending April 30, 2009, revenue is expected to be approximately $28 million, plus or minus 10%. The net loss is expected to be in the range of $(0.22) to $(0.19) per share, assuming 127 million shares outstanding. The net loss guidance does not include amortization of purchased intangibles of $4.4 million."

Wednesday, March 4, 2009

Seagate 8K - VP cuts

"On March 4, 2009, in connection with the measures designed to lower the Company’s cost structure described in Item 2.05 of a Current Report on Form 8-K dated January 14, 2009, the Company announced that it will terminate the employment of five senior vice-president and seventeen vice-president level employees, representing approximately 20% of Seagate positions at or above the vice-president level. These terminations will take effect beginning on May 4, 2009, and represent steps taken by the Company to realign its overall management organization and reduce costs while increasing spans of control and decreasing management layers to support the business outlook going forward."

Netlogic Microsystems 10K

Customer concentration: "In 2008, 2007 and 2006, Cisco, including its contract manufacturers, accounted for 38%, 50% and 61% of our total revenue, respectively. Cisco accounted for a smaller portion of our total sales in 2008 as we increased our customer diversification. Notably, Alcatel-Lucent became a 12% customer, by revenue, in 2008. We expect to continue to further diversify our customer account base in 2009."

Wafer foundry: "Our principal wafer foundry is TSMC in Taiwan. We are actively involved with product development on next-generation processes, and are designing products on TSMC’s most advanced logic processes. The latest generation of our products employs up to eight layers of copper interconnect and 300 millimeter wafer sizes."

Assembly and test: "We currently rely on Amkor Technology, Inc., Advanced Semiconductor Engineering, Inc. in Taiwan, King Yuan Electronics Co., Ltd. in Taiwan, ISE Labs, Inc. and Viko Test Lab in the U.S. to assemble and test our products."

Patent foundation: "As of February 5, 2009, we held 246 issued U.S. patents and 12 issued foreign patents with expiration dates ranging from 2011 to 2027."

Employees: "As of December 31, 2008, we had 255 full-time employees worldwide, including 161 in research and development, 46 in operations, 27 in sales and marketing and 21 in general and administrative."

Volterra 10K

Customer concentration and trends: "In 2008, IBM, Metatech, and Sabre each accounted for over 10% of our net revenue, and collectively accounted for 71% of our net revenue. In 2007, IBM, Metatech, Sabre and EIL each accounted for more than 10% of our net revenue, and collectively accounted for 81% of our net revenue. In 2006, IBM, Metatech and Sabre each accounted for more than 10% of our net revenue, and collectively accounted for 65% of our net revenue."

Revenue by end market: "In 2008, we estimate that 60% of our net revenue was derived from sales in the server and storage market, 11% from the networking and communications market, 20% from the desktop and workstation market; and 9% from the consumer and portable market."

Employees: "As of December 31, 2008, we had 182 full-time employees. There were 94 employees in research and development, 40 in sales, marketing and field services, 24 in general, administrative and finance and 24 in operations support."

Wafer foundry: "We are a fabless semiconductor company and as such, we rely on third-party semiconductor manufacturers, or foundries, such as Chartered Semiconductor Corporation and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Corporation."

Assembly and test: "We rely on third-party subcontractors, such as Amkor Technology, STATS ChipPAC Ltd., Carsem, Advanced Semiconductor Engineering and UTAC, to assemble and test our products."

Legal actions: "In November 2008, we filed a lawsuit in the United States District Court in the Northern District of California against Primarion, Inc., Infineon Technologies AG and Infineon Technologies North America Corporation (the “Defendants”), Case No. CV 085029, for infringement of Volterra’s U.S. patent numbers 6,278,264, 6,462,522, 6,713,823, 6,020,729 and 6,225,795, which seeks declaratory relief, an injunction, unspecified damages, and attorneys’ fees against the Defendants............."

Gennum Annual Form (Toronto Stock Exchange)

Customers: "Our top OEM customers for our financial year ended November 30, 2008 were as Avago Technologies, Inc., Cisco Systems, Inc., Evertz Microsystems Ltd., Finisar Corporation, Harris Corporation, JDS Uniphase Corporation, Panasonic Corporation, SONY Corporation, Sumitomo Corporation and Thomson S.A. Our sales to these customers accounted for a total of approximately 39% of our net revenues for our financial year ended November 30, 2008."

Sales by Product Group (US$):
  • Analog & Mixed-Signal: $97.9M, 77.1%
  • Optical: $17.6M, 13.9%
  • IP Licensing: $11.4M, 9.0%
Wafer Foundries: "We are a “fabless” semiconductor company, and outsource wafer fabrication for our products to third-party silicon wafer foundries such as United Manufacturing Corporation ("UMC"), STMicroelectronics and Tower Semiconductor Ltd. (Jazz)."

Employees: "At the end of the financial year of the Corporation ended November 30, 2008, we employed 429 people in our operations. The functional breakdown of our employees is as follows:
  • Administrative: 82
  • Research & Development: 168
  • Operations: 90
  • Marketing & Sales: 64"
(No explanation as to why the totals don't match)

Intersil 10K

Wafer sources: "During fiscal year 2008, we internally produced approximately 20% of our wafers and outsourced the remaining 80% from foundry partners.....IBM Microelectronics, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company and United Microelectronics Corporation. "

Patent foundation: "We currently possess over 1,000 U.S. and foreign patents and have approximately 570 U.S. and foreign patents pending."

Employees: "Our worldwide workforce consisted of 1,531 employees (full- and part-time) as of January 2, 2009."

2008 acqusitions: "During the third quarter of 2008, we purchased D2Audio Corporation (“D2Audio”) and Kenet, Incorporated (“Kenet”). D2Audio was a privately-held fabless semiconductor company with leading technology in the design of digital audio power amplifiers. Kenet was a privately-held, fabless semiconductor company with leading technology in the design of high-speed, extremely low power data converters. During the fourth quarter of 2008, we purchased Zilker Labs, a privately-held, fabless semiconductor company with technology leadership in high efficiency digital power integrated circuits. The purchase consideration for the three acquisitions was $43.2 million in cash paid to complete the mergers, net of cash and cash equivalents received for the three companies, and for professional fees and the assumption of certain liabilities. The purchase consideration is subject to change depending on the final purchase accounting. Based on our preliminary evaluations, which are expected to be completed no later than the third quarter of fiscal year 2009, the acquisitions included approximately $11.4 million of definite-lived intangible assets, which will be amortized over five to seven years, and goodwill of approximately $19.0 million. In addition, approximately $3.0 million of in-process research and development (“IPR&D”) was expensed as a result of the acquisitions."

Tuesday, March 3, 2009

Cadence Design Systems 10K

Revenue breakout and trends:
  • "Product revenue was $516.6 million, or 50% of our total revenue, during fiscal 2008; $1,104.0 million, or 68% of our total revenue, during fiscal 2007; and $982.7 million, or 66% of our total revenue, during fiscal 2006.
  • Maintenance revenue was $388.5 million, or 37% of our total revenue, during fiscal 2008; $385.2 million, or 24% of our total revenue, during fiscal 2007; and $366.3 million, or 25% of our total revenue, during fiscal 2006.
  • Services revenue was $133.5 million, or 13% of our total revenue, during fiscal 2008; $125.8 million, or 8% of our total revenue, during fiscal 2007; and $134.9 million, or 9% of our total revenue, during fiscal 2006."
Loss on Mentor Graphics stock: "During fiscal 2008, we purchased approximately 4.3 million shares of Mentor Graphics common stock in connection with our proposed acquisition of Mentor Graphics. After the announcement of our withdrawal of the proposed acquisition of Mentor Graphics, we sold our entire equity interest in Mentor Graphics at a loss of $9.4 million."

Change in DFM strategy:
"Our primary focus in DFM is to address manufacturing effects as early in the product development process as possible. As a result, we are enhancing the DFM awareness of our core Encounter Digital IC and Virtuoso Custom IC product offerings. Where upstream integration is not possible, Cadence offers certain stand alone DFM products. In connection with our cost savings initiatives that were implemented during the fourth quarter of fiscal 2008, we adjusted our roadmaps and investment consistent with our current DFM strategy. The changes in our DFM strategy resulted in an impairment charge of $42.5 million arising from the abandonment and reduction to net realizable value of certain identifiable intangible assets."

Employees: "As of January 3, 2009, we employed approximately 4,900 individuals, with approximately 1,800 in sales, services, marketing, support and manufacturing activities, approximately 2,400 in product research and development and approximately 700 in management, administration and finance. During fiscal 2008, we initiated a restructuring plan to decrease costs by reducing our workforce across the company. This restructuring plan is expected to reduce our workforce by at least 625 positions. Approximately 300 of the affected employees were still employed by us as of January 3, 2009 due to regulatory requirements in certain jurisdictions in which we operate. "

SiRF 10K

Acquisition note: "On February 9, 2009, SiRF signed a Merger Agreement with CSR..."

Wafer foundry:
"Four outside foundries, IBM in the United States, Samsung in South Korea, STMicroelectronics in Italy and France and TSMC in Taiwan, currently manufacture substantially all of its products. Also, in 2007, with the acquisition of Centrality, SiRF began using Global Uni Chip, a design foundry, to provide turnkey solutions for its SoC products."

Patent foundation:
"As of December 27, 2008, SiRF had 330 patents granted worldwide. Of this total, SiRF has 201 patents granted in the United States and 129 patents granted in foreign countries..."

Employees: "As of December 27, 2008, SiRF had 571 active, permanent employees, including 408 in research and development, 69 in sales and marketing, 48 in operations and 46 in general and administrative."

Recent IP legal action: "On April 2, 2007, Global Locate filed a complaint with the ITC regarding certain of SiRF Technology’s GPS devices as well as products SiRF Technology made for four of its customers, and the ITC subsequently instituted an investigation. Upon its acquisition of Global Locate, Broadcom was subsequently added as an additional complainant to the investigation. In August 2008, the ITC concluded that all six of the asserted Broadcom patents (1) had an existing domestic industry, (2) were valid, and (3) were infringed by certain of SiRF Technology’s products, and issued a recommendation that (1) those of SiRF Technology’s products that are accused products in the investigation, if found to infringe a patent at issue in the investigation, should be excluded from the United States, (2) a Limited Exclusion Order should be extended to products containing any of SiRF Technology’s products that may be found to infringe, and (3) Cease and Desist Orders should be issued prohibiting SiRF Technology from importing or selling in the United States those of SiRF Technology’s products which may be found to infringe any asserted patent. In January 2009, the ITC issued the ITC Final Determination in this matter and issued a Limited Exclusion Order prohibiting unlicensed entry of the infringing products into the United States by or on behalf of SiRF Technology or the Named Respondents, and Cease and Desist Orders against SiRF Technology and the domestic Named Respondents. The ITC’s remedial orders are subject to review by the President of the United States, acting through the United States Trade Representative’s Office, for sixty days. During that time, imports of affected products may continue subject to the posting of a bond. SiRF Technology has not obtained approval to date from U.S. Customs for the importation of its products into the United States containing new versions of its software and, if SiRF Technology or its customers are unable to do so, SiRF Technology’s business could be materially and adversely affected. SiRF has not sought pproval from U.S. Customs on any new versions of the GSCi-4100, GSCi-4200 and GSCi-5000 hardware products. Furthermore, no assurance can be given that Broadcom will not seek to bring an enforcement action against SiRF Technology alleging violations of the Limited Exclusion Order and Cease and Desist orders."

Power Integrations 10K

Patent foundation: "As of December 31, 2008, we held 245 U.S. patents and had received foreign patent protection on these patents resulting in 138 foreign patents."

Wafer foundry: "To manufacture our wafers, we contract with four foundries: OKI Electric Industry, or OKI, Seiko Epson Corporation, or Epson, XFAB Dresden GmbH & Co KG, or XFAB, (a wholly owned subsidiary of X-FAB Semiconductor Foundries AG), and Panasonic."

Employees: "As of December 31, 2008, we employed 402 full time personnel, consisting of 87 in manufacturing, 132 in research and development, 150 in sales, marketing and applications support, and 33 in finance and administration."

LSI 10K

Customer concentration: "In 2008, Seagate Technology accounted for approximately 17% and International Business Machines Corporation accounted for approximately 16% of our total revenues........Our top 10 end customers in 2008, based on revenue, accounted for approximately 60.7% of our revenue."

Wafer fabrication: "Our wafer fabrication is performed by third-party foundries, including Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Corporation, our primary foundry partner, and other foundries such as IBM and Silicon Manufacturing Partners, a joint venture owned by Chartered Semiconductor and LSI."

Assembly and test: "We also use third-party suppliers, including STATS ChipPAC and Amkor Technology, to perform final assembly and test operations for us."

Patent foundation: "As of December 31, 2008, we had approximately 11,000 U.S. patents and patent applications and a number of related foreign patents and patent applications."

Employees: "As of December 31, 2008, we had 5,488 full-time employees."

Recent legal actions: "On March 23, 2007, CIF Licensing, LLC, d/b/a GE Licensing (“GE”) filed a lawsuit against Agere in the United States District Court for the District of Delaware, asserting that Agere products infringe patents in a portfolio of patents GE acquired from Motorola. GE has asserted that four of the patents cover inventions relating to modems. GE is seeking monetary damages. The Company believes it has a number of defenses to the infringement claims in this action, including laches, exhaustion and its belief that it has a license to the patents. The court postponed hearing motions based on these defenses until after the trial, and did not allow the Company to present evidence on these defenses at trial. On February 17, 2009, the jury in this case returned a verdict finding that three of the four patents were invalid and that Agere products infringed the one patent found to be valid and awarding GE $7.6 million for infringement of that patent. The jury also found Agere’s infringement was willful, which means that the judge could enhance the verdict up to three times its original amount. The court has not scheduled hearings on the Company’s post-trial motions related to its defenses. One of these motions seeks to have a mis-trial declared based on the Company’s belief that GE withheld evidence in discovery which affected the Company’s ability to present evidence at trial. The court has agreed to appoint a special master to investigate this matter. If the jury’s verdict is entered by the court, the Company would also expect to be required to pay interest from the date of infringing sales and estimates that interest through the end of 2008 could amount to approximately $2 million. If the verdict is entered, LSI intends to appeal the matter."

Monday, March 2, 2009

Triquint 10K

Revenue and trends by reporting segments:
  • "As a percentage of our total revenues, our revenues from handsets products accounted for approximately 52% in 2008, compared to 53% of revenues in 2007 and 51% of revenues in 2006.
  • Our revenues from networks products accounted for approximately 37% of our total revenues in 2008, compared to 36% in 2007 and 37% in 2006.
  • Our military business accounted for approximately 11% of our total revenues in 2008, compared to 11% in 2007 and 12% in 2006."
Fabrication technology and locations: "The core process technology in our Hillsboro, Oregon wafer fabrication operation employs both implanted and epitaxial structures, 4 micron metal pitch, typically 0.5 or greater micron geometries, involves 10 to 18 mask steps, and is scalable. The recent addition of an optical process for 0.25 and 0.13 micron gates gives a significant advantage in cost, with a small degradation in performance, over the typical e-beam process required to achieve those types of gate structures. The process technology employed in our Texas wafer fabrication operation includes eight advanced performance production processes: 0.5 micron gate length MESFET for amplifier applications; two 0.15, a 0.25 and a 0.5 micron gate length pHEMT for high power and high frequency applications; a 0.15 micron gate length mHEMT process for ultra-high frequency and low noise applications; HBT for high voltage, high linearity and high power density; 0.5 micron gate length HFET for high voltage, high power amplifiers and switches and Vertical P-I-N diode (VPIN) for signal control devices such as switches, limiters and attenuators. In our Florida wafer fabrication operation, we use manufacturing techniques that are very similar to those for integrated circuits to produce our SAW devices. In our Texas and Bend, Oregon wafer fabrication operations, we use manufacturing techniques that are very similar to those for integrated circuits to produce our BAW devices."

Employees: "As of December 31, 2008, we employed approximately 2,297 persons, including approximately 1,630 in manufacturing and support related positions, 335 in process, product and development engineering, 165 in marketing and sales and 167 in general and administration functions."

Atmel 10K

Revenue by reporting segment:
  • Microcontrollers $523M up 14% (33% of total revenue)
  • Nonvolatile Memories $339 down 10% (22% of total revenue)
  • RF and Automotive $250M down 19% (16% of total revenue)
  • Application Specific Integrated Circuit $455M down 8% (29% of total revenue)
Additional revenue disclosures and trends:
  • "AVR (microcontroller) products accounted for 23%, 20% and 16% of total revenue for the years ended December 31, 2008, 2007, and 2006, respectively.
  • Serial EEPROM products accounted for 13%, 15% and 13% of total revenue for the years ended December 31, 2008, 2007 and 2006, respectively.
  • Smart Card ICs accounted for 12%, 11% and 12% of total revenue for the years ended December 31, 2008, 2007, and 2006, respectively."
Employees: "At December 31, 2008, we employed approximately 6,400 employees compared to approximately 7,400 employees at December 31, 2007."

ASIC business: "On February 4, 2009, we announced that we are pursuing strategic alternatives for our ASIC business and related manufacturing assets which include our Rousset, France fabrication facility, which alternatives include a potential sale. We have engaged a third party financial advisor in connection with the evaluation of strategic alternatives for the ASIC business."

Update on Quantum World legal action: "In January 2007, Quantum World Corporation (“Quantum World”) filed a patent infringement suit in the United States District Court, Eastern District of Texas naming Atmel as a co-defendant, along with Lenovo (United States) Inc., Lenovo Group Limited, Winbond Electronics Corporation and Winbond Electronics Corporation America (collectively “Winbond”), National Semiconductor, and IBM Corporation (“IBM”). The plaintiff claimed that the asserted patents allegedly cover certain true random number generators interfaced to general purpose computers and that the patents were infringed by the manufacture, use importation and offer for sale of certain Atmel and other products. In December 2008, the plaintiff settled with Atmel and IBM, and the claims against the Company were dismissed with prejudice on January 15, 2009. In December 2008, co-defendant Lenovo (United States), Inc. (“Lenovo”) filed a motion to enlarge the time allowed to amend its answer in order to add cross-claims for indemnification against the Company and Winbond. Lenovo sought to allege a claim for breach of warranty against infringement under the Uniform Commercial Code, and a claim for breach of contractual and/or common law indemnification to indemnify and hold Lenovo harmless from the plaintiff’s infringement claims. Lenovo sought unspecified damages, an order requiring indemnification, an order requiring the cross-defendants to seek a license or otherwise protect, indemnify, and hold Lenovo harmless against any injunction or other equitable relief the plaintiff may seek, attorneys’ fees and costs for the infringement litigation and the cross-claim, pre-judgment interest, and other relief. The Company and Winbond opposed this motion. In February 2009, Lenovo superseded its motion to enlarge time by filing another motion for leave to amend to allow Lenovo to file a third amended answer, counterclaims against Quantum World, and cross-claims against Atmel and Winbond. The proposed cross-claims against the Company allege a purported breach of a contractual duty to defend Lenovo and a purported breach of an implied warranty under common law and the Uniform Commercial Code, and requests Lenovo’s defense costs incurred through January 15, 2009 in the underlying infringement action. The Company intends to vigorously defend against Lenovo’s allegations should the court allow Lenovo to assert them."

Wafer process information: "We currently manufacture Parallel Flash products utilizing 0.18- and 0.13-micron process technologies."

Anadigics 10K

Revenue and mix shifts: "Net sales for the year ended December 31, 2008 for the Company’s wireless products increased 19.9% to $154.7 million compared to net sales for the year ended December 31, 2007 of $129.0 million. The net sales improvement was primarily due to increased demand for power amplifiers for 3G applications of $34.7 million or 29.1%, most significantly in WCDMA applications. The growth in 3G was partially offset by lower net sales in power amplifiers for GSM of $9.1 million or 91.5%, which resulted from the Company’s shift in market focus to 3G technologies. Net sales for the year ended December 31, 2008 for the Company’s broadband products increased to $103.5 million or 2.0% compared to net sales for the year ended December 31, 2007 of $101.5 million. The net sales improvement was due to increased demand for integrated circuits used in cable set-top boxes of $10.2 million or 55.4% partly offset by a decline in cable infrastructure and WiFi applications of $8.2 million or 9.9%."

Customer concentration:
"Sales to Intel Corporation and Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd accounted for 18% and 16%, respectively, of total net sales during 2008."

Wafer source and processes:
"Our six-inch diameter Gallium Arsenide (GaAs) wafer fabrication facility (fab) located at our corporate headquarters in Warren, New Jersey, has been operational since 1999. We are actively exploring future sources of additional manufacturing capacity including pursuing relationships with foundries.......We design, develop and manufacture RFICs primarily using GaAs compound semiconductor substrates with various process technologies, Metal Semiconductor Field Effect Transistors (MESFET), Pseudomorphic High Electron Mobility Transistors (pHEMT), and Heterojunction Bipolar Transistors (HBT). Our patented technology, which utilizes InGaP-plus, combines InGaP HBT and pHEMT processes on a single substrate, enabling us to integrate the PA function and the RF active switch function on the same die."

Patent foundation: "We own 65 U.S. patents and have 6 pending U.S. patent applications."

Recent material legal action: "On or about November 11, 2008, plaintiff Charlie Attias filed a putative securities class action lawsuit in the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey, captioned Charlie Attias v. Anadigics, Inc., et al., No. 3:08-cv-05572, and, on or about November 21, 2008, plaintiff Paul Kuznetz filed a related class action lawsuit in the same court, captioned Paul J. Kuznetz v. Anadigics, Inc., et al., No. 3:08-cv-05750 (jointly, the "Class Actions"). The Complaints in the Class Actions, which were consolidated by an Order of the District Court dated November 24, 2008, seek unspecified damages for alleged violations of Sections 10(b) and 20(a) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as well as Rule 10b-5 promulgated thereunder, in connection with alleged misrepresentations and omissions relating to, among other things, Anadigics's manufacturing capabilities and the demand for its products. The longer of the proposed class periods alleged in the Class Actions runs from February 12, 2007 through October 22, 2008. Currently pending before the District Court are various motions by certain members of the proposed class seeking appointment as Lead Plaintiff.

On or about January 14, 2009, a shareholder's derivative lawsuit, captioned Sicari v. Anadigics, Inc., et al., No. SOM-L-88-09, was filed in the Superior Court of New Jersey, and, on or about February 2, 2009, a related shareholder's derivative lawsuit, captioned Moradzadeh v. Anadigics, Inc., et al., No. SOM-L-198-09, was filed in the same court (jointly, the "Derivative Lawsuits"). The Derivative Lawsuits seek unspecified damages for alleged state law claims against certain of the Company's current and former directors arising out of the matters at issue in the Class Actions. The plaintiffs in the Derivative Lawsuits have filed a motion seeking, among other things, to consolidate their respective suits."