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ASM International has said that it has received an offer for the entire front-end business operations of the Dutch equipment supplier from Applied Materials. Applied’s initial offer for the ALD and CVD activities remains unchanged at between $400 and $500 million but Francisco Partners is offering between $225 million and $300 million for the remaining units that include epitaxy and vertical furnaces. Read more >>

A major semiconductor IC manufacturer based in Asia has placed a multi-million euro order with Vistec that includes one LMS IPRO4 and one LWM9045 system, which are used for advanced photomask metrology applications. Read more >>

According to the latest worldwide semiconductor manufacturing equipment billings from SEMI, first quarter 2008 figures reached $10.56 billion, seven percent greater than the fourth quarter of 2007 and two percent less than the first quarter of 2007. Read more >>

SVTC Technologies has placed an order with Tegal for its ‘6500 HRe’ plasma etch tool that will be used for the development of a variety of novel memory, MEMS/MOEMS, photovoltaics, biotechnology and image sensor devices. Tegal and SVTC also said that they are working together on process recipe development for these applications. Read more >>

Although ASM International’s Supervisory Board has rejected the offer by Applied Materials to acquire its ALD and CVD businesses for between $400 million and $500 million in cash, ASM left the door open to the world’s largest semiconductor equipment supplier to pursue alternative strategies. Read more >>

The Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) has lowered its semiconductor sales forecast for 2008, citing strong unit demand but continued price erosion in the memory market that is expected to drag down the sales figures overall. The SIA is now projecting growth of 4.3 percent for 2008, compared to its previous projection of 7.7 percent growth. In its mid-year forecast the SIA is projecting that 2008 sales will reach $266.6 billion. Read more >>

Hynix Semiconductor has expanded bulk gas supply contracts with Air Liquide Electronics at its new 300mm fab located in Cheongju, South Korea and its joint venture 300mm fab in Wuxi, China. Read more >>

Freescale has said that its MRAM (Magnetoresistive Random Access Memory) technology, manufacturing and IP have been transferred to a new company, EverSpin Technologies, backed by a group of venture firms. Freescale will hold a share in the company but has not revealed its actual stake. The move was touted by Freescale as the best way forward to see a faster adoption of the technology in the multiple markets to which the technology could be applied. Read more >>

Chartered Semiconductor has made an investment in Taiwan-based SOCLE Technology Corporation, known for its system-on-chip (SoC) design services using ARM cores and developing ARM-based platforms. Financial terms of the investment were not announced. Read more >>

ASM International has publicly announced that it has received an unsolicited offer for its ALD and PECVD product ranges from Applied Materials who is offering between $400 million and $500 million for the two businesses. Read more >>