Market research group Gartner has lowered its forecast for semiconductor equipment manufacturing gear sales in 2009, just weeks after a previous downgrade.

In October, Qimonda sold its 35.6% interest in Korean chipmaker Inotera for US$400 million to Micron and is using those proceeds to restructure its core business. German newspaper WirtschaftsWoche said that after Micron has completed the restructuring process it could acquire Qimonda with the purchasing price of the Korean chipmaker being credited against the purchase of Qimonda.

...In the most precarious situation is ProMOS, which ended the third quarter with about US$76 million in cash, a third of what it started the year with. Investors in a US$350 million convertible bond issued by ProMOS in 2007 will be able to start selling the bond back to the company in February, although it isn't due until 2012. The company has another US$225 million bond due in June 2010, according to Dealogic.

...Microchip, which said it pulled out after On ended its pursuit of Atmel, may seek to team up with another company and make a new bid for Atmel, Suji De Silva, an analyst with Kaufman Bros., said in an interview. Microchip is still an interested buyer, De Silva said. There could be another partner or they may go it alone.

Gartner today lowered its capital and equipment spending forecast for the second time in as many months, warning that the next year could see a capital spending decline of about 17% and capital equipment revenue decline of 18%. The revised forecast comes after Gartner in October suggested 2009 equipment demand would be slower than anticipated.

Privately held semiconductor company Novafora Inc agreed to buy microchip designer Transmeta Corp in a cash transaction worth $255.6 million. The expected offer price of between US$18.70-19.00 per share is at a 7-8% premium to Transmeta's closing price on November 17. The deal is expected to close in the first quarter of 2009. Transmeta also entered into an agreement under which Advanced Micro Devices will transfer 700,000 of Transmeta's preferred stock to the company.

Semiconductor company Intersil said Wednesday it is cutting its global work force by 9% because of the current economic turmoil. "Unfortunately, we are entering a period of significant uncertainty and we feel the prudent approach is to respond quickly," said Dave Bell, chief executive, in a statement.

Germany's state of Saxony and Infineon's loss-making unit Qimonda are in talks about a possible rescue plan, a spokesman for Saxony's Economics Ministry said on Monday. A company spokesman declined to comment on the report but said Qimonda and the state in eastern Germany were in constant contact. Qimonda runs a production plant in Dresden -- the capital of Saxony.

...financial institutions will be allowed to loan a total of NT$600 billion to businesses under the program, which runs until 2010. Sources have suggested that the government should be more audacious in trying to raise funds to stimulate industry and public construction.

Leading chip-equipment maker Applied Materials warned that profit in the current quarter would fall far short of Wall Street expectations due to the weakening global economy. The company also said on Wednesday it would slash 1,800 jobs, or 12 percent of its workforce, to generate annual savings of $400 million.

ARM and Canonical, the commercial sponsor of Ubuntu, have announced that they will bring the full Ubuntu Desktop operating system to the ARMv7 processor architecture to address demand from device manufacturers. The addition of the new operating system will enable new netbooks and hybrid computers, targeting ARM technology-based SoCs.

DRAM makers have been cutting back their production in two waves already, but the economic downturn and reduced demand appears to make the situation even worse. DRAMeXchange said that it expects the industry to cut production by another 6% or 70,000 12” wafers in December, with more announcements possible in January.

National Semiconductor, hit by a downturn in wireless handset sales, cut its projected revenue for the fiscal second quarter Wednesday, and said it will cut 330 jobs.

German chipmaker Infineon said it would not honor a wage deal reached on Wednesday for the 3.6 million workers employed in the country's engineering sector. Only hours after employers and unions in the state of Baden-Wuerttemberg agreed on a pilot deal for a 4.2% wage hike through April 2010 in two stages, Infineon issued a statement declaring its intentions and withdrew from the VBM employers' federation. For the current fiscal year to end-September 2009, Infineon would not increase any wages for some 6,000 engineering workers.

...if you understand the reasons why people move from one technology to the next, i.e., 45 to 32, what are the things you're looking for? You're looking for increased performance, reduced power, and above all, you're looking for increased density. Density means size, size means cost, and cost means profit. In SOI, you're taking two of the three of those reasons to move, and providing them without moving. IMoving from 45 bulk to 45 SOI, if your application demands it, probably gives you a better performance increase than moving from 45nm to 32n

In 2009, the MEMS market could face negative growth for the first time," said analyst Marlene Bourne of Bourne Research. "There will likely be at least 18 months of slow consumer growth. The killer app during the slowdown over the next 18 to 24 months will be specific to individual companies–those that succeed will be the ones that identify a significant need and provide a solution.

Microchip Technology and On Semiconductor stepped up their US$2.3 billion takeover attempt of Atmel Wednesday, saying they will nominate a dissident slate of directors for the chip maker's board.

Shares of microchip-design software maker Cadence Design Systems have lost almost 80 percent of their market value in the last 12 months as the company grapples with management changes, job cuts, a depleted cash flow and an aborted acquisition attempt. As expectations from investors seem to have bottomed and estimates have been cut significantly, the company is now positioned such that any positive incremental news can have a pronounced impact on the stock.

Citing the IC downturn, Gartner has cut its forecast for the semiconductor assembly and test services (SATS) market. In the current forecast, the SATS market is expected to grow 1.6 percent in 2008, but the sector will fall 4 percent in 2009.

Like all chip makers, Renesas (Tokyo) faces the possible impact of the current economic crisis and IC slowdown. Renesas has not publically lowered its sales and profit forecasts for fiscal 2008. But clearly, the current economic crisis in the United States and elsewhere could have a "severe effect" on the semiconductor industry, warned Katsuhiro Tsukamoto, president and chief operating officer at Renesas. "Consumer demand will drop," Tsukamoto told EE Times in an interview. Worldwide capital spending "will slow down."

Things were looking better for Qualcomm than they had in a long time. Demand for its technology has been strong, and it had finally settled a long-running royalty dispute with top mobile phone maker Nokia. But that was before the economy started really falling to pieces, dragging the wireless-chip maker down with it.

Qualcomm’s fiscal fourth quarter results were boosted by payments from its recent deal with Nokia, but it was cautious about 2009, highlighting the pressure on the CDMA market and on handsets in general.

Leading vendors are diversifying their product lines, driving down operating costs and improving production efficiencies to mitigate ongoing problems in the mainstream DRAM industry. Manufacturers are putting renewed priority on developing more power-efficient parts. Meanwhile, DRAM manufacturers continue to push the process envelope to higher densities.

PRAM, known as perfect RAM, is the next-generation memory chip which features the advantages of NAND and NOR flash memories. Samsung will begin mass production of 65-nano 512MB PRAM in the first half of 2009 for the first time in the world.

For flat-panel makers, control over the supply of LED die appears to be a key strategic decision. But for a foundry company like TSMC, that argument is irrelevant. Any market entry for TSMC would only make sense if demand for LEDs with specific wavelengths and emission characteristics becomes huge. This could ultimately be the case in general lighting, where three or four individual chips might go into every solid-state lighting "bulb" for future domestic applications.

THine Electronics and Winbond Electronics has announced that the two companies agreed to transfer Winbond's Image Signal Processor (ISP) Business to THine. Winbond's ISP products are specially designed for high-end camera and mobile phones. Winbond will transfer assets including its intellectual property rights and ISP-related assets in fiscal year 2008, establishing a new company to transfer to THine.

This option enables Motorola, within a specified time period, to enter into a pre-negotiated license agreement with Tessera and settle all outstanding litigation between the companies. If Motorola exercises the option and takes the license, it will pay royalties on all its products that include chips that use Tessera's technology and are sourced from companies who are not Tessera licensees. Detailed terms of the agreements including the time period, option fees, license fees and license royalties are confidential.

Taiwan announced measures to loosen loan and payment conditions on Monday to help the island's loss-making DRAM memory chip makers. Three major DRAM makers in Taiwan -- Powerchip, Nanya Technology and ProMOS -- are struggling with falling chip prices caused by oversupply. They have been in the red in the past several quarters.

SanDisk has been hurt by falling prices for NAND memory chips, a type of flash memory the company makes for consumer gadgets like music players and digital cameras. But a Goldman Sachs analyst said key intellectual property rights associated with the chips give the SanDisk more value than the market has recognized.

Swiss chip maker STMicroelectronics has begun laying off workers at its Phoenix factory after a hoped-for sale of the plant never materialized. Spokesman Mike Michael Markowitz said about 100 of the plant's 850 workers were let go this week and that the process would continue. The company announced plans to close the 25-year-old plant last year and move those jobs to lower-cost facilities overseas.

Backed by a strong investor, Advanced Micro Devices is expected to expand its production lines and next foundry service providers such as Fab 36 and Fab 38 in Dresden, Germany. During a congress in Munich, Udo Nothelfer, VP, manufacturing and technology, for AMD's Fab 36, gave details on the company's strategy and road map. "AMD's expansion plans are based on the presumption that the trend in the IC industry toward fab-lite and fabless business models will create added demand for foundry services," said Nothelfer.

IBM has also bolstered parts of the shaky SOI supply-chain to propel its initial SOI foundry service in the market. But some wonder if the technology will gain traction amid the current IC slowdown and economic crisis. To fuel a new class of SOI designs, IBM will provide a 45-nm foundry service within its own fabs. As part of the plan, Singapore's Chartered Semiconductor Manufacturing will act as a "second source" foundry for IBM's 45-nm SOI offering. And ARM Holdings announced a physical IP library offering for IBM's SOI technology.