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May 01, 2007 at 04:29 PM |
In February, Intel said that its first microprocessors using its 45nm process would be brought forward into late 2007 compared to a previous expectation of early 2008. First working wafers were produced only a few months ago so wafers yields must have been acceptable to potentially speed the migration.
The confirmation of this filtered out indirectly through comments made by Doug Neugold, President and Chief Executive Officer of ATMI during a recent conference call with financial analysts, as well as from a very innocuous press release announcing a new product win (http://www.fabtech.org/content/view/2775/2/).
I got to the press release before listening to the conference call; had it been the other way round then the news story would have been much more meaningful!
In the conference call Neugold said:
"As for our long awaited copper HVM or High Volume Manufacturing CMP slurry order, our qualification has been successfully completed and we have our first PO [Purchase Order]. We believe this critical win will positively influence the work we are doing in the marketplace and will have initial product revenue in Q2[07], which will ramp through the year as more of their lines are shifted."
For those who have followed ATMI, then it is well known that this new CMP slurry is for 45nm production. The keyword in Neugold's comments was ‘volume.' With Intel being the only one close to 45nm ‘volume' production, I think it is safe to say that Neugold was referring to the microprocessor giant.
Though obviously at a very early ramp phase and with a 12-week average cycle-time plus test and packaging time, the end of 3Q07 looks like a good time for product launch!
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