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Old 06-24-2006, 02:20 PM
Yamaha B-2 Yamaha B-2 is offline
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Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: NJ Shore
Posts: 53
Not to put too fine a point on it, but the Kokusai furnaces that Intel uses and ASM epi machines at TI, etc., don't do that much for U.S. jobs, other than hold the line a bit. The folks doing the construction/install work might be unemployed or whatever, otherwise, I grant you. But, with only Applied Materials, Lam and a few other, considerably smaller U.S. companies supplying the tools and very little concrete (generally Mexicans, I agree - what did Daniel Boone say when he woke up at the Alamao and saw all the Mexicans? "I didn't know we were pouring concrete today." I've poured MANY yards of concrete and very little of it since ~1990 has been with anyone other than Mexican labor, especially in the west) then we are simply holding our own. I don't think there is a U.S. based vacuum pump manufactuerer at all today. Want a dry roughing pump or turbo pump it will come from Asia or Europe. I've forgotten the name of the cryopump company (Helix was the parent), but I'll bet they are pretty much gone or foreign owned by. Especially with the level of robotics and automation and 'copy exact' in the fabs of today. Better than nothing, but I'm guessing that all the new fabs put together will not result in more than a few thousand permanent new jobs in the U.S. That is simply the name of the game, unfortunately.
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