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."