| | By Mike Magee @ Tuesday, July 22, 2008 12:28 PM
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| | Malcolm Penn, CEO of Future Horizons, said today that there's every chance the price of processed silicon wafers could soar.
Speaking at the analyst firm's Semiconductor Forecast seminar in Kensington, Penn said that Jerry Sanders III, the ex CEO of AMD, once described wafer production as the 'crude oil' of the chip industry.
While the price of a processed 65 nanometre wafer currently stands at $1,500, Penn said there's every possibility wafer prices could soar to $10,000 rather than $1,500.
Part of the reason is a lack of capacity, he said. There will be allocation of wafers, and there will be price rises. If you haven't got fab capacity you haven't got units and you haven't got sales. The industry is being driven by chief financial officers rather than CEOs who understand the business. CFOs should be taken out and shot, he said.
Fab light and startups will be fighting for wafers. He said that unless there is a sudden and real IC unit demand slowdown, there will be a serious capacity shortage through 2009.
Fab capacity needs to grow three percent per quarter rather one one percent to keep pace with unit demand. X
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