Applied Materials's US$4.9 billion purchase of Varian Semiconductor may trigger a round of acquisitions in the chip-machinery industry, making companies such as Novellus Systems possible targets.

Applied Materials and Varian Semiconductor Equipment Associates have announced the signing of a definitive merger agreement under which Applied will acquire Varian for US$63 per share in cash. The acquisition will extend Applied's leadership in wafer fabrication equipment with the addition of the technology leader in ion implantation.

The worldwide semiconductor equipment market grew 143% in 2010 to nearly US$41 billion as the market recovered from the industry slowdown of the previous two years, according to Gartner.

Hynix Semiconductor will collaborate with engineers in Sematech's 3D Interconnect program at CNSE's Albany NanoTech Complex to address industry infrastructure and technology gaps in materials, equipment, integration and product-related issues for high-volume adoption of through-silicon-vias (TSV).

Toshiba has developed a new flip-flop circuit using 40nm CMOS process that the company claims will reduce power consumption in mobile equipment. Measured data verifies that the power dissipation of the new flip-flop is up to 77% less than that of a conventional flip-flop and that it achieves a 24% reduction in total power consumption when applied to a wireless LAN chip.

CSR and Zoran have entered into a merger agreement under which Zoran will merge with CSR for an equity value equivalent to approximately US$679 million. The merged company will provide differentiated, integrated technology that addresses the rapidly-growing market for connected, location-aware multimedia devices including handsets, digital cameras and home entertainment equipment.

Huawei Technologies Co., China's largest telecommunications equipment maker, won a court order barring Motorola Solutions Inc. from disclosing confidential information about Huawei's technology to Nokia Siemens Networks, which plans to buy Motorola's wireless networks business.

The pending acquisition of Motorola's mobile telecom equipment arm by Nokia Siemens Networks (NSN), which is pending approval by China's Ministry of Commerce, would make it more difficult for domestic rivals Huawei Technologies and ZTE to enter the US market, an analyst said.

Texas Instruments has narrowed its fourth-quarter financial forecasts that match analysts' projection, citing higher demand for communications equipment.

Citigroup analyst Timothy Arcuri asserted in a research note that Samsung is pushing out US$750 million to US$1 billion of equipment orders targeted at DRAM capacity expansion. Lam is the company most exposed to the move, Arcuri said.

ZTE, one of China's largest network equipment and phone suppliers, is set to buy US$3 billion worth of semiconductor components from five US technology vendors. It has signed the purchase agreements with Qualcomm, Texas Instruments, Freescale Semiconductor, Altera and Broadcom.

Toshiba made 48% of its products in Japan in the period from April to September 2009 and bought 45% of its components from Japan-based suppliers. By the same period this year, the ratios were down to 44% and 42%, respectively. The change added 4.2 billion yen to Toshiba's operating profits in the half to September, or 700 million yen for each one-yen increase in the Japanese currency's value against the dollar.

But shares of Veeco, which makes precision manufacturing equipment for the LED and data storage markets, slipped after hours as the company predicted some revenue slated for the fourth quarter may not come in until early next year.

"Beceem's talented teams of engineers in India and the US have been focused on enabling a 4G ecosystem of operators and equipment manufacturers to drive the deployment of 4G networks," said Scott Bibaud, Broadcom's Executive VP & GM of the Mobile Platforms Group. "We look forward to adding their innovative technologies to our product portfolio and providing these technologies to our customers."

"We have put on hold the purchase of copper wire bonders," said Byron Chiang, spokesperson for Siliconware Precision Industries (SPIL), on the phone. "Orders are not coming along as strong as we originally thought."

Rudolph Technologies has received an order for its multiple PrecisionWoRx VX4 probe card test and analysis systems from a customer in Taiwan to facilitate capacity expansion.

Arm Holdings has taken the wraps off its next major chip design, promising a five-fold increase in performance that the company hopes will take it beyond smartphones and into new types of equipment such as high-performance routers and servers.

ZTE Corp., China's second-biggest maker of telephone equipment, is expanding in the US with an agreement to sell a handset through Verizon Wireless.

Applied Materials has forecast quarterly results that beat Wall Street estimates, with demand for its chip-making gear holding up despite fears of weakening technology spending. But the company warned that sales of solar and energy equipment would slide 10-20% this quarter.

The mid-year edition of the SEMI Capital Equipment Forecast predicts that sales of global semiconductor equipment are growing in all regions in 2010. Taiwan is again, projected to be the largest market with US$9.18 billion.

Chip equipment maker UMS, which counts Applied Materials as its biggest client, will boost capacity utilisation to 85% in the third quarter from 65% in a booming industry.

Chip equipment maker Veeco Instruments has posted a second-quarter profit that surpassed Wall Street expectations, helped by strong LED and solar orders, and forecast a strong third quarter.

Chipmaking equipment company is adding local jobs for first time in three years as sales rebound.

Ericsson, the world's largest maker of telecom network equipment, said Friday that an industry-wide shortage of key components had contributed to an 8 percent decline in sales in the second quarter, echoing concerns raised earlier this week by Nokia.

Applied Materials said demand for semiconductor and solar-panel manufacturing equipment in Europe is growing rapidly, a sign the region's debt crisis isn't crimping spending.

South Korea, Asia's fourth-biggest crude oil importer, is considering expanding the list of alternative-energy equipment eligible for a tax benefit to cut reliance on fossil fuels.

At an analyst briefing at the Semicon West trade show, Applied Materials indicated that it now expects 140% on-year revenue growth for its semiconductor equipment business for the October 2010 fiscal year, an increase from the company's previous forecast of 120% growth.

Texas Instruments said it is ramping up a second phase of expansion at a factory near its Dallas headquarters. The expansion will double the plant's capacity to produce chips that go into products such as cell phones, computers and telecommunications equipment.

Veeco Instruments, which makes equipment used to produce LEDs, solar cells and data storage, expects second-quarter earnings of US$0.78-0.90 a share, before items, on revenues of US$220-240 million.

Chip equipment maker Novellus Systems now expects to earn US$0.43 per share, US$0.04 above the high end of the range it had forecast in March. The company is scheduled to report first-quarter earnings on April 21.

Applied Materials has opened its new Singapore Operations Center, Applied's first facility in Asia for manufacturing its advanced semiconductor equipment.

In much of the world, ZTE is better known as a maker of telecom networking equipment and data cards than cellphones. But research firm iSuppli says the Shenzhen-based company shipped enough phones during the last quarter to break into the top group of handset makers, displacing Motorola.

Toshiba plans to spend 15 billion yen (US$160 million) in 2010 to build a test production line for advanced flash memory chips, according to the Nikkei business daily. The NAND flash memory vendor has already ordered chip-making equipment from ASML to produce microchips with circuitry widths of less than 25 nanometres.

Applied Materials topped the list of semiconductor equipment vendors for the eighteenth consecutive year in 2009, a year in which mere survival was noteworthy amid a painful recession and steep industry downturn, according to VLSI Research.

Japanese trading house Marubeni has said it has received an order for 16 Nikon LCD-making machines from China's Beijing BOE Display Technology. The equipment will be installed in the China-based company's 8.5-generation thin film transistor LCD panel production line.

"These comments beg the question how will the equipment market grow 50-plus-percent in 2010 with no new fabs and no new capacity additions, when it dropped nearly 50% in 2009 with no new fabs and no new capacity additions?"