James Morgan Global Quotations

Semiconductor manufacturers remain cautious but continue to invest in advanced technologies, as they balance their need to develop the most advanced process capabilities with the uncertainties in the global economy and the impact of near-term weakness in chip demand,

Our industry, I think, is in pretty good shape. There's a big requirement on a global basis to move to the smaller line widths for the next round of chip sets, ... ?But clearly we are seeing up-ticks in Korea, Taiwan, Japan, Europe and the United States.

Our team has done a great job. They're working hard on a global basis to be a world-class company, and we have made a lot of investments in information age projects, ... For example, we spent about $150 million to upgrade our telecommunications and upgrade our information and business processes. So, we see productivity improvements will help us and we see a lot of companies making that kind of investment.

What is important for Applied Materials is to prepare for change and focus on building a great global growth company.

Strong global demand for semiconductors is driving our customers to increase and accelerate their year 2000 capital spending for expanded capacity and more advanced technologies, ... We expect increasing demand for semiconductors to continue throughout 2000, driven by the growth of applications in telecommunications Internet-related and consumer products.