03/15/2006  Colorado Springs, CO — Photo Stencil's upcoming 2006 workshops will provide information on stencil printing performance and how stencil technology and stencil design each impact this performance. Data generated by independent test laboratories during print performance studies, along with Photo Stencil's Dr. Bill Coleman, vice president of technology, and Mike Burgess, stencil product manager, will come together to offer pertinent information.

03/15/2006  March 15, 2006 - South Korea has asked to sit down with Japanese officials to discuss a move to levy countervailing duties on DRAM memory chips, possibly a prelude to pushing the World Trade Organization for a ruling on the dispute.

03/15/2006  March 15, 2006 - ChipMOS Technologies Ltd. posted a profit of $14.5 million on revenues of $130.4 million in 4Q05, up from a $3.2 million profit and $112.0 million in sales in the same period a year ago.

03/14/2006  March 14, 2006 - Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. has ramped to volume production of its 512Mb DDR2 DRAM using 80nm process technologies.

03/14/2006  March 14, 2006 - Despite current near-maximum capacity utilization rates comparable with or even above previous cyclical tipping points, a similar downturn is likely not in store in the near-term for the semiconductor industry, according to analyst firm Advanced Forecasting.

03/13/2006  March 13, 2006 - Four schools in California have joined to establish the Western Institute for Nanoelectronics in an effort to explore spintronics as a possible alternative to silicon CMOS for semiconductor devices beyond the 65nm node.

03/09/2006  March 9, 2006 - Sematech has begun work on a project to investigate alternative materials to silicon in MOSFET channels, in an effort to develop process technologies that achieve enhanced mobility without compromising reliability.

03/09/2006  Clinton, NY — Indium Corp. of America will exhibit its wafer and chip bumping and semiconductor packaging materials offerings at IMAPS' International Conference and Exhibition on Device Packaging (DPC 2006), to take place March 20–23, 2006, in Scottsdale, Arizona, at booth #35.

03/09/2006  March 9, 2006 - Demand for Japanese semiconductor manufacturing equipment continues to gain momentum, with consecutive months of orders that were much stronger than a year ago, according to new data from the Semiconductor Equipment Association of Japan (SEAJ).

03/08/2006  March 8, 2006 - Micron Technology Inc., Boise, ID, has agreed to acquire Lexar Media Inc., Fremont, CA, in a $690 million stock swap. Through the deal Micron bolsters its NAND flash business with controller and system design technology.

03/08/2006  March 8, 2006 - Spansion Inc., the former flash memory JV between AMD and Fujitsu, has filed a trademark infringement lawsuit against Macronix International and Macronix America concerning false statements about its MirrorBit flash products.

03/07/2006  March 7, 2006 - Infineon Technologies AG has developed a computer memory module with an integrated thermal sensor using real-time temperature data to optimize system performance, targeting use in forthcoming mobile platforms from Intel.

03/07/2006  Willow Grove, PA — Kulicke & Soffa Industries Inc. (K&S) has closed the sale of all assets of its wafer test business to SV Probe Pte Ltd. (please see January 27^th story) The wafer-test assets were reportedly sold for $10.0 million, which includes the assumption of accounts payable and certain other liabilities, and are subject to a post-closing working capital adjustment.

03/07/2006  March 6, 2006 - Toshiba Corp. plans to spend 500 billion yen (roughly US $4.3 billion) to build a fourth plant at its Yokkaichi facility to make NAND flash memory chips.

03/03/2006  March 3, 2006 - Four sales & marketing executives from Hynix Semiconductor have pleaded guilty and accepted jail times and fines for their roles in a DRAM price-fixing conspiracy.

03/01/2006  March 2, 2006 - Global semiconductor manufacturers increased their addition of both capacity and actual usage in 4Q06, signs that the industry continues to gain momentum during the normally slow post-holiday seasonal period, according to new data from Semiconductor International Capacity Statistics (SICAS).

03/01/2006  Last fall, Clayton Teague sat under fire as members of Congress peppered him with questions about nanotechnology’s potential for a big oops: nano-based materials or products that could harm people or the environment.

03/01/2006  A few days after Intel’s announcement, Freescale Semiconductor (Austin, TX) stated it had solved the problem of building metal oxide semiconductor field effect transistor (MOSFET) devices in gallium arsenide (GaAs)-an innovation that could mean new uses for GaAs, since GaAs MOSFETs should be faster than their similarly sized silicon counterparts.

03/01/2006  METROLOGY TOOLS PROVIDE SOLUTIONS

03/01/2006  Until recently, micro-systems technology resonant-mode inertial measurement units (IMUs) have had limited lifetime.