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Happy June everyone!
We are starting the "Summer Slowdown." Next scheduled Newsletter
will be Mid - July.
This edition is dedicated to the memory of Stan Karandanis.
Please send updates, memories, or just plain news.
Dan
===========================================================
Please send us ideas on changes, additions or how we can make this
newsletter more useful. Thanks, Millie & Dan
==========================================================
Reminders:
The MMI community can advertise available jobs, as well as people
looking for work can post links to resumes. Please send in either job
listings or resume links, with desired situation to Dan.
"Links" page for web pages you would like listed please send the URLs in
as well as a single line description.
===================================
Web site: http://www.mmialumni.com/
Submit your photos with text and we will post them on the web site with
any text you would like to capture relating to the photo. Please send
to millie486 (at) mmialumni.com
=====================================
This e-mail portion of the MMI News will remain text only.
MMI News
====================================
Check out the website -
Michael Heddlesten submitted some photo's taken at the 2006 Reunion.
If you have any photo's from the reunion, please email them to us for
posting....
Thank you Michael....
============================================
Dear Millie:
It is with great sadness that I must inform you that Stanley Karandanis,
an MMI alumni and founder of Datacube passed away on the 9th May, 2007.
I'm sorry to be the bearer of such sad news.
Andy Wilson
============================================
Dan
I hate to give news like this by e-mail but none of my phone numbers for
the MMI people seem to be good. Stan Karandanis passed away this
afternoon at the Brighams and Woman's hospital in Boston from Lung
Cancer. His family was at his side.
The wake will be held on
Sunday, May 13,2007 from 5:00-8:00 PM
Brewitt Funeral Home
9 Pleasant St. Epping, NH
Trisagion service at 6:30 PM.
www.brewittfuneralhome.com
Funeral services will be held Monday, May 14, 2007 at 10 AM
St. George Greek Orthodox Cathedral
650 Hanover St.
Manchester, NH
Burial will follow in the Pine Grove Cemetery, Manchester, NH.
In lieu of flowers, donations may be made in his memory to the
St. George Greek Orthodox Cathedral, 650 Hanover St., Manchester, NH
03104 or to the charity of one's choice.
Give me a call if you wish and I will pass on any information as I
get it. Also if you have Brikners, HT and Irwin phone number I would
appreciate it or give them mine.
--
J Stewart Dunn
Design Engineer
Windham, NH 03087-1219
==========================
Stan died yesterday ~ 1:00 PM from cancer. He had been in the
hospital for the last two months getting very aggressive treatments,
and his passing was a blessing. When I get any additional info re the
service, I will pass it on. This is a man that lit up a room with his
intellect, personality, and his love of life, in other word
"The Perfect Salesman!" Well, there are many stories to tell about all
his many accomplishments, not the least he being one of the most
important people in saving MMI from going out of business in that
difficult time of transitioning from a PROM company to THE PAL company.
Best regards, Russ French
============================================
During MMI's turn-around days, the company acted and felt like a family.
We managed to retain unusual closeness for years thereafter, but, during
the siege of 79-80, it was like defending Stalingrad. Stan Karandanis
was part of that tightly-knit, one for all-all for one group. He could
be both passionate and laconic, sometimes in the same half hour. He
could do block diagrams with any engineer/customer with whom he engaged.
He almost always smiled. As I write this I envision a broad smile, his
eyes creasing, and giving you the "cat that ate the canary" look.
Stan's attitude was a fear blunter, and he backed it up by putting
numbers on the board. I was privileged to know his family and to be
his friend. He enriched all of us, left us with glowing memories.
Those of us who attended the reunion last year revisited a taste of
him. His hair was grayer and in a pony tail, he'd put on some
weight, but the same grin, the same Stan. That was the last time
I saw him.
Thanks for everything, Stan, you enhanced my life.
Goodbye, old friend. -Irwin
===============================================
I first met Stan Karandanis[ Special K as I called him] at Fairchild
Semiconductor in 1969 prior to his joining Russ French at MMI.]
I was fortunate as an FSE to be able to utilize Stan,an FAE at my accounts.
Needless to say any sales success I had was greatly enhanced by Stan's
technical expertise,business acumen and winning personality. I
interviewed with Tom Branch in October, 1977 for the National
Distribution Sales Mgmt position at MMI. It was a major move
for me from my New England roots to Silicon Valley. I met with
my friend, Stan who assured me of the wonderful team I would be
joining at MMI. This helped me make the right decision and I joined
MMI in January, 1978.
It was ironic that when I decided to go back to the Northeast that
Stan left MMI and founded his company, Datacube. This allowed me
to stay with the wonderful MMI team and organization. Of course
nobody could fill Stanley's role so Russ French hired Mike Volpigno
as our FAE. Yes it took two of us to fill Stan's large shoes.
One of my memories of Stan's many accomplishments was during our
difficult transition times that Russ French alluded to in his
announcement of Stan's passing. I guess this sticks in my mind
because at both Fairchild & ITT Semiconductor my previous two
companies we sold 74LS logic. At this time Stan is back at headquarters
at the behest of Irwin and was reviewing all our products that had not
passed the test specs to see if there were any products in the mix that
we could sell for much needed revenue. 74LS products demand was not
being met by the various suppliers s@}ú o the shortages created an
opportunity. Stan in his wisdom and creativity wrote up some reduced
specs and created a 68LS product line that we were able to sell to
some of our major customers who were desperate for LS products. So
MMI a memory and then a programmable logic company became the only
one that ever sold 68LS logic products.
After the 1986 merger with AMD I stayed with them for many years and
ultimately retired from Lattice in 2003. During these years about
once or twice a year Stan and I would have lunch where we would
reminisce about the MMI days, the business of the day and our children.
Stan had 3 daughters and a son and I had 3 daughters. I had a pleasant
surprise at the evening of my retirement party, Stan came. He was
one of the speakers along with Russ French and talked about our career
journey and the times that we shared. He then closed by regaling the
audience with a humorous anecdote about one of my trips East when we
were together at MMI. At this time, by the way, Stan is 69 years old
and I'm 68. Only Russ and I knew that the story he told was not about
me but Pete Marra my predecessor at MMI.
All of us that had the privilege to work with this man has our own
special memories but we all mourn his passing.
Stan Karandanis-One of a kind....
Regards, Jack Abbott
============================================
Stan was an upstanding guy. He always treated everyone as if they were
friends, I will miss him.
Larry McKinnon
============================================
Dan,
Hifn laid me off this week,so I'm actively looking for something
new. If you know of anything, please let me know. I'm willing to
move for the right job. Most recently, Cisco account manager.
Bob Norling
============================================
I was not an 'early' employee of MMI, but I was there for a handfull of
years. I was over in Building 2 in Quality - if you ever needed SEM work
between 1979-85, I was your man, Don Ashley. Anyway, can I get added to
your email and employee lists ? I would also be interested in any future
reunion efforts.
Thx,
Don Ashley
===========================================
I am leaving AMD at the end of this week (I volunteered for the last
RIF: the severance package was too good to miss it!).
After some vacation (till 6/6/07) I'll be seeking some other job, as I
feel still too energetic to remain inactive.
Thanks for this and for all the good work you did for that site!
Armando Bottelli
===========================================
Please send in your ideas for ways to make the MMI Alumni site more
useful.
Never say die News Editor - Millie Clark
Chief Cook & Bottle Washer - Dan Kinsella dankinsella (at) mmialumni.com
MMI Alumni web page http://www.mmialumni.com/
MMI News page http://www.mmialumni.com/news.htm
========================================================
I'd like to thank all those who have been spreading this around, and
encourage everyone to send this to MMIers that are not on the list. Have
them email me with their name, e-mail address, and where they are
currently working. (dankinsella(at)mmialumni.com)
========================================================
Quote for the month -
"I am an optimist. It does not seem too much use being anything else."
- Winston Churchill
========================================================
For those interested -
"FLAMEs (Former Loyal Advanced Micro Employees) is the official
association of exAMDers. Please check our "FLAMEsite"
http://www.flamesite.org/
and, if you wish to join, drop me a line: jmckean (at) rogers.com
May MMI Newsletter
Hope all is well with you. It's just starting to warm up here in
Upstate NY.
Bring on the nice weather!!
Dan
===========================================================
Please send us ideas on changes, additions or how we can make this
newsletter more useful. Thanks, Millie & Dan
======================================================
Reminders:
The MMI community can advertise available jobs, as well as people
looking for work can post links to resumes. Please send in either job
listings or resume links, with desired situation to Dan.
"Links" page for web pages you would like listed please send the URLs in
as well as a single line description.
===================================
Web site: http://www.mmialumni.com/
Submit your photos with text and we will post them on the web site with
any text you would like to capture relating to the photo. Please send
to millie486 (at) mmialumni.com
=====================================
This e-mail portion of the MMI News will remain text only.
MMI News
====================================
As a guy who only spend several years at MMI I appreciate this
newsletter. I was at MMI in the worst possible year (1979) but Irwin
talking over as CEO saved things.
I had the happy experience of working a consulting job at silicon image
an dran in to several former MMI people one of whom i had worked closely
with.
On Jim Wurm: his company closed (hence the email bounce) and he moved
back to New Orleans. I will try to track him down and get an updated
email. Jim was and is one of my great friends but we lose touch now and
then. During the 1979 gas crisis Jim and I would run to and from work
every other day (18 miles round trip) but back then we were both
competitive runners and we didn't mind. it was fun running by the gas
lines.
Regards
Rich (Stiller)
============================================
>From the Flames site:
Joe McDonough j.mcdonough (at) yahoo.com
Bay Area, CA
FLAME - Joined: Apr 2006
At AMD: ex-MMI'er, AMD Distribution Marketing manager, HQ Sales,
Peterson Bldg., 1985-1990
Currently: General Partner, Barrington Partners, seed stage venture
capital www.barringtonpartners.com
Interests: Cycling, digital photography
Hi Fellow AMD Loyalists -
After both Al Frugaletti (repeatedly over a couple of years) and Ken
Smyth (just today) advised that I should join this group, I'm finally
getting around to signing up.
I departed from Al's Distribution Sales organization at AMD in 1990 to
join Altera. At the time, there were some who said that my new employer
was about to go out of business, and in fact, the skeptics would have
been right if Altera hadn't developed some new products on newer
technolgoies. Luckily for me, they did. Within a few months of my entry,
sales began the "hockey stick" in the up&right direction, and the rest
is history. My responsibilities grew with the company, and I ended up as
Director of N. American Distribution.
In 1998, I exited Altera to partner with my brother in starting a small
VC business. We pooled our modest savings and plugged it into some
.coms. (one of which was E-Loan) and did well enough to raise a serious
VC fund from outside investors. From there we had a few good years, and
had three other Series-A investment hits including zipRealty.com (which
is still doing reasonably well, all things considered). No, I won't tell
you about our many failures but there are some interesting stories in
that category, as you can imagine.
At this point our Fund is going on 8 years and is winding down, and I am
looking for my next "thing." I have no interest in semi or full-time
retirement. (My parents worked full-time into their late 60s, and I
expect to follow the same path, at least.) I am always interested in
leveraging my experience in venture capital, I am also interested in
getting back into technology management. I am actively looking for a
senior position in business development, product line strategy, or HQ
sales/marketing, and if you know of anything in that vein, I'd welcome
an email or phone call (j.mcdonough (at) yahoo.com)
But, as they say, "enough about me, what do you think of me?"
More seriously, thanks for reading this far. It feels good to resurface
in this community, and I hope to re-establish some good connections with
AMDers.
Best to all,
Joe McDonough
There you go Al, I did it.
============================================
Please send in your ideas for ways to make the MMI Alumni site more
useful.
Never say die News Editor - Millie Clark
Chief Cook & Bottle Washer - Dan Kinsella dankinsella (at) mmialumni.com
MMI Alumni web page http://www.mmialumni.com/
MMI News page http://www.mmialumni.com/news.htm
========================================================
I'd like to thank all those who have been spreading this around, and
encourage everyone to send this to MMIers that are not on the list. Have
them email me with their name, e-mail address, and where they are
currently working. (dankinsella(at)mmialumni.com)
========================================================
Quote for the month -
Everyone who's ever taken a shower has an idea. It's the person
who gets out of the shower, dries off, and does something about
it that makes a difference.
Nolan Bushnell - Founder of Atari
========================================================
For those interested -
"FLAMEs (Former Loyal Advanced Micro Employees) is the official
association of exAMDers. Please check our "FLAMEsite"
http://www.flamesite.org/
and, if you wish to join, drop me a line: jmckean (at) rogers.com
April MMI news:
Not a lot of news this month other than Al Northwoods passing.
Hope Spring is looking up for everyone!
(and DST problems are over - the only ones I had were products
that were synchronized to Government services like WWV and Internet
'Time keeping' sites - they just updated today. Apparently the
government is good at telling others what to do, but not so good
at doing it themselves...)
======================================================
Reminders:
The MMI community can advertise available jobs, as well as people
looking for work can post links to resumes. Please send in either job
listings or resume links, with desired situation to Dan.
"Links" page for web pages you would like listed please send the URLs in
as well as a single line description.
===================================
Web site: http://www.mmialumni.com/
Submit your photos with text and we will post them on the web site with
any text you would like to capture relating to the photo. Please send
to millie486 (at) mmialumni.com
=====================================
This e-mail portion of the MMI News will remain text only.
MMI News
====================================
Some sad news Al Northwood passed away early this morning.
-------------------------------------
Bonnie -
My Condolences.
Please let me know the details so I can pass them along to the MMI
'family.'
Thanks,
Dan
------------------------------------------
Thanks Dan,
I am having Memorial Services for him on Sunday the 25th of March at
Floyd's Chapel Church, Maury City, TN. It is a little church way out in
the country where I grew up and I now attend regularly. Al had been
with me many times in the last few years and made a lot of friends
there.
I don't know what Richard told you, but he had been in the hospital
for a hernia and they took out part of his colon that was diseased at
the same time. This was on January 27th. Well, he aspirated during
surgery and then he got pneumonia, so they had him in ICU for two
weeks...He was better so they put him on a regular floor and they took
him down to surgery to repair his dialysis port and while he was on the
table his heart stopped .They put him on the respirator and took him
back to ICU, where he stayed another week. Then back to the floor and
they released him on the 21st of February to go to a Skilled Nursing
Home to have therapy for his hands and legs. He was there for 19 days. I
guess his heart just stopped. They had checked his vitals at 1 am and he
was fine and at 5 am, nothing, so they did CPR and rushed him to the ER
where they worked on him too, but he was flat lined the doctor said and
was showing no signs of life. I just told them to stop working on him,
it had been nearly an hour they were doing the CPR...I figured he had
had enough.
He had been through so much though, they were going to have to
amputate both legs above the knees and he knew this and was fighting
with all his might not to have this done.
Thanks to everyone for their get well wishes four years ago...he
pulled through that, and though it was a day to day struggle for us, at
least I had him here with me for those extra years...
============================================
Al was a friend; I did know he was diabetic, terrible disease.
Larry McKinnon
============================================
Tom Branch memories - conclusion
As we entered our fiscal 1986, the business for our customers took an
upward swing. Because we had been able to hold onto most of our key
people through the downturn [by again using reduced work weeks, pay
cuts, and tightly controlled expenses] MMI was poised to respond to a
much needed increase in quoting activity and new business bookings.
We were able to rapidly respond to increasing production demands,
allowing us to return to an upward growth cycle.
As 1986 closed we were able to show sales revenue of $204.9 million,
a healthy increase in sales of over 15% from 1985. Looking back on it
now, our increase for the year was almost equal to our total sales in
1979, only seven years before. Our profits, however fell to
$8.9 million, due to a number of factors including continued price
erosion, and greatly increased Research and Development costs.
Most of us felt pretty good about the overall results though, because,
once again we were among the elite in the industry in our financial
performance and we had placed a heavy investment in R&D which would
pay dividends for all of us in future years. In addition, our balance
sheet showed that we had $106+ million cash in the bank!!!
Little did we know that 1986 would be our last hurrah!! I don't
remember the date, [it was the equivalent of 9/11 for us so I should
remember it] but it was announced in Irwin's staff meeting that
Advanced Micro Devices, one of the licensees of our Pal technology,
intended to make an offer to buy MMI!!
I felt personally like I had been hit by a truck. MMI had, in the
last 8 years developed a culture unlike any other in the semiconductor
industry and had grown, prospered, shared the good times and the bad
times and had never had to let a single employee go. It was almost as
if our entire family had been devastated in a natural disaster. The
people in my organization felt like my brothers and sisters to me,
and now that was all going away.
It was impossible for me to be objective about the situation,
partially due to my allegiance to our team, but also because I
knew most of the key players in the Sales organization at AMD
from my days at Fairchild semiconductor. Our sales culture and
philosophy could not have been more divergent. We were, in fact
polar opposites in the way we conducted ourselves. If MMI had
one word that showed up again and again in our performance, it
was 'we'. The AMD philosophy had two words, the very large 'I '
and very small 'you '
After innumerable meetings and 'due diligence' the deal was finally
done and MMI was absorbed by AMD. I stayed on for a short period of
time in an effort to help my friends find jobs worthy of their
talent in the AMD organization. My heart was not in it though,
and I knew that most of our folks would not be able to, or want
to adapt to AMD's ways of doing business.
And so ended the best 11 years of my career. It could have been a
lot longer. We could have grown MMI to a billion dollar company in
my opinion, but on the other hand, we were also within 90 days of
closing the doors, so on balance, I'm grateful for the opportunity,
gratified by the results we had, and thankful for the friends I
made during that time.
As tiny Tim said: 'god bless us, every one'
============================================
Please send in your ideas for ways to make the MMI Alumni site more
useful.
Never say die News Editor - Millie Clark
Chief Cook & Bottle Washer - Dan Kinsella dankinsella (at) mmialumni.com
MMI Alumni web page http://www.mmialumni.com/
MMI News page http://www.mmialumni.com/news.htm
========================================================
I'd like to thank all those who have been spreading this around, and
encourage everyone to send this to MMIers that are not on the list. Have
them email me with their name, e-mail address, and where they are
currently working. (dankinsella(at)mmialumni.com)
========================================================
Quote for the month -
I know the difference between right and wrong, and I can tell good
from bad. But I also know that the more difficult decisions come when
we have to choose between good and better. The toughest calls of all
are those we have to make between bad and worse.
Oliver North
========================================================
For those interested -
"FLAMEs (Former Loyal Advanced Micro Employees) is the official
association of exAMDers. Please check our "FLAMEsite"
http://www.flamesite.org/
and, if you wish to join, drop me a line: jmckean (at) rogers.com
March MMI Newsletter
Spring is only a couple of weeks away!!
Enjoy.
======================================================
Reminders:
The MMI community can advertise available jobs, as well as people
looking for work can post links to resumes. Please send in either job
listings or resume links, with desired situation to Dan.
"Links" page for web pages you would like listed please send the URLs in
as well as a single line description.
===================================
Web site: http://www.mmialumni.com/
Submit your photos with text and we will post them on the web site with
any text you would like to capture relating to the photo. Please send
to millie486 (at) mmialumni.com
=====================================
This e-mail portion of the MMI News will remain text only.
MMI News
====================================
Yeng Peng worked in the CMOS Yield Enhancement group around 1984-1987 (I
think he worked at MMI before and after this, but those were the years I
was there). I had the pleasure of working under him for one of my GTP
rotations, he was a great guy to learn from and work for.
Bob Burd
=========================================================
Dan,
I can't tell you how much fun it is to reminisce every time I look over
your monthly newsletter.
I was surprised and saddened on the news that Dr. Yeng Peng had passed
away.
I can only add that I knew Dr. Yeng Peng because we both worked for Dave
Coakley in the Fab 5 Yield Enhancement group. I think that Dr. Peng
started his career at MMI working with our group. He was a very amiable
person and a very capable engineer. We had a great time in this group,
Under Dave's guidance and we all felt that we contributed much to Fab 5.
I am so sorry to hear about his passing.
Regards,
Carlos DeMarchena
SUMCO USA Corp
============================================
Hi Dan,
Yeng Peng worked for me in the Santa Clara Yield Enhancement group
supporting Fab Five and Fab One. This would be about six months after we
opened the campus. Prior to MMI he had been at Nitron with Rich Forte.
Yeng subsequently reported to Nick MacCrae and then went on work at the
AMD SDC.
Yeng was probably one of the best hires I ever made. I cannot say enough
about his technical abilities, moreover his work ethic and positive
attitude made every day we worked together a pleasure.
I am enclosing a PDF which provides more background on the life of Dr.
Peng.
Yeng Kaung Peng
Regards,
Dave Coakley
======================================
Hi Dan,
I worked at MMI from 1977 to 1985, mostly with the product engr group,
Murdo MacGregor and Bob Likens. Wayne Cantu hired me.
Haven't been on your list, please add me.
I am interested in locating Dave Sweeney. Could you check to see if you
have any contact for him? Or send me the whole list and I'll look.
(I don't have him - if anyone else does, please let me know. - Dan)
Thanks,
Joe Wilkinson
=============================================
Please send in your ideas for ways to make the MMI Alumni site more
useful.
Never say die News Editor - Millie Clark
Chief Cook & Bottle Washer - Dan Kinsella dankinsella (at) mmialumni.com
MMI Alumni web page http://www.mmialumni.com/
MMI News page http://www.mmialumni.com/news.htm
========================================================
I'd like to thank all those who have been spreading this around, and
encourage everyone to send this to MMIers that are not on the list. Have
them email me with their name, e-mail address, and where they are
currently working. (dankinsella(at)mmialumni.com)
========================================================
Quote for the month -
If you enjoy your job, you never have to go to work.
Unknown
========================================================
For those interested -
"FLAMEs (Former Loyal Advanced Micro Employees) is the official
association of exAMDers. Please check our "FLAMEsite"
http://www.flamesite.org/
and, if you wish to join, drop me a line: jmckean (at) rogers.com
February 2007 MMI Newsletter
=====================================================
The following people whose address I have as at AMD are bouncing back
suddenly. I don't know if they have left AMD, or if the MMI Newsletter
is being blocked.
Please let me know if these are still with AMD or if they have new
addresses.
Thanks!
Sylvia Araujo
Albert Braceros
John Breen
Edwin Cervantes
Nida Cid
Jim Cronin
Richard Cunningham
Monica Durling
Kathy Hill
Dolly Lara
Dan McCarthy
Mike McClelland
Nick MacCrae
Bruce Milani
Marlene Monforte
Gerry Peffer
Paul J. Steffan
Susan Tovar
Nick Tripsas
Kevin Woods
Alan Yu
===================================
Reminders:
The MMI community can advertise available jobs, as well as people
looking for work can post links to resumes. Please send in either job
listings or resume links, with desired situation to Dan.
"Links" page for web pages you would like listed please send the URLs in
as well as a single line description.
===================================
Web site: http://www.mmialumni.com/
Submit your photos with text and we will post them on the web site with
any text you would like to capture relating to the photo. Please send
to millie486 (at) mmialumni.com
=====================================
This e-mail portion of the MMI News will remain text only.
MMI News
====================================
From Messalina Wang
Please send the following message to MMI folks.
Many of us knew Yeng Peng at MMI/AMD.
Yeng passed away on Jan 8.
He worked at MMI, AMD and TSMC (Sr. QRE director) .
Yeng moved back to US in 2004 and worked at Kilopass with me.
====================================
So folks have asked when Yeng Peng worked at MMI and in what group.
Please let me know and I will pass the information along.
Thanks,
Dan
=========================================================
Please send in your ideas for ways to make the MMI Alumni site more
useful.
Never say die News Editor - Millie Clark
Chief Cook & Bottle Washer - Dan Kinsella dankinsella (at) mmialumni.com
MMI Alumni web page http://www.mmialumni.com/
MMI News page http://www.mmialumni.com/news.htm
========================================================
I'd like to thank all those who have been spreading this around, and
encourage everyone to send this to MMIers that are not on the list. Have
them email me with their name, e-mail address, and where they are
currently working. (dankinsella(at)mmialumni.com)
========================================================
Quote for the month -
Everyone who's ever taken a shower has an idea. It's the person who gets
out of the shower, dries off, and does something about it that makes a
difference.
Nolan Bushnell - Founder of Atari
========================================================
For those interested -
"FLAMEs (Former Loyal Advanced Micro Employees) is the official
association of exAMDers. Please check our "FLAMEsite"
http://www.flamesite.org/
and, if you wish to join, drop me a line: jmckean (at) rogers.com
January 2007 MMI Newsletter
Happy New Year!!
=====================================================
Reminders:
The MMI community can advertise available jobs, as well as people
looking for work can post links to resumes. Please send in either job
listings or resume links, with desired situation to Dan.
"Links" page for web pages you would like listed please send the URLs in
as well as a single line description.
===================================
Web site: http://www.mmialumni.com/
Submit your photos with text and we will post them on the web site with
any text you would like to capture relating to the photo. Please send
to millie486 (at) mmialumni.com
=====================================
This e-mail portion of the MMI News will remain text only.
MMI News
====================================
Dear Friends,
We wanted to send a thank you to all that have supported and helped our
family during what we can only explain as the worst time in our lives.
The cards, the flowers, the phone calls, the visits and the meals have
helped more than we can express. It will take us a while to get through
this but the support of the people around us is what will make it
possible.
With all our gratitude
Rhonda, Rob and Sara Medlin
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Hello, Am trying to locate Robert William Bartley: my roommate at the US
Air Force Academy in year 1961. We called him "Bill" then. Believe that
he worked for MMI in Sales.
Any help you could provide would be appreciated,
Glen Wilson
(Anyone who knows where Bill Bartley is please let me know - I will pass along to Glen. dan (at) bytes2go.com )
====================================
Love the newsletter, thanks for carrying the torch and publishing.
The reunion was awesome, it was great to see everyone. I hadn't been to one
for a looong time, but it still felt like I had see most people 'just the
other day'.
Thanks Tom Branch for the 'Tom Branch Memories'. I am holding my breath for
the next installment, I hope it covers when I first started in the fall of
'84.
Greetinga again to all my old friends that I saw at the reunion, and a
special thanks to George and Linda for putting the whole shebang together.
David Selby
=====================================
I'm Mary Ann Oakes old mmi employee 'inside sales group' started in 1980
and still at AMD.
I started my own jewelry website. Its
www.thejewelryhunt.com
I need all the help I can get. There are men's and woman's
Fine jewelry, costume jewelry, and loose gem stones.
Mary ann
====================================
I was at MMI from 1975-1977 during the time the company was exploring
bipolar vs. CMOS/VMOS/NMOS technology. I ran the test lab and helped the
team bring up the first DRAM's under license from National Semiconductor.
Ken Moyle was in charge of this team.
I just heard about this Alumni group and would like to get linked in.
Wyatt Starnes
====================================
I have certainly enjoyed the MMI News that you faithfully send. It is
good to hear about and from folks that I worked with during my time
at MMI.
I was hired by Ken Gates as Facilities Manager in May 1979 and left in
September 1986, a few months before the AMD takeover. I agree with Tom
Branch that those were exciting times. I remember Tom stating at an
Operations Review meeting early in the 1980's that ".guess what folks,
MMI is no longer a small company" paraphrased by me..
I especially like Tom Branch's shared memories and Ken Gates' response
and addition.
Attached is a photograph taken in 1980 at the ground breaking of
Building 7 in Santa Clara. While this was not the first new facility
for MMI in the 1980's it was by far the biggest and most expensive, It
would eventually house Fab 5 and a R&D fab. This almost doubled MMI's
original square footage. Buildings 1, 2 & 3 together totaled
approximately 80,000 square fee. Building 7 was 75,000 square feet.
Building 5 on Lakeside Drive and Building 6 at 1135 Arques came first.
You might recognize some of the people in that photo from over a
quarter of century ago.( I don't recognize them all).starting on the far
left is a City Council Woman from Santa Clara, Bill Wall, Mike
Callahan, that's me holding the shovels, of course Irwin in the
foreground, Muni Aggrawal (sp?), Jacob Dayan, Keith Peterson, Bob
Aquino( with the bow tie), John Charles talking to Bob A, Cyrus Tsui, Pauline Curiel,
Zelimar Diehl (in the back) and John Birkner. Kevin Kim, next to Larry Mckinon and
Wayne Cantu behind Kevin.
Perhaps some others can
fill in the blanks where my memory failed.
Building 7 was almost a "bet the company" kind of project as it was very
expensive and a large part of MMI's production capacity would be tied
up in it.
We had to do some interesting things during the construction such as
building 100,000 gallon underground storage tank with a diesel pump
for fire protection, sheet rocking the entire underside of the roof
and building a building within a building for the fab.
While this project was underway, we also did extensive modifications
to the existing fab 3 in Sunnyvale, converting it to 4" and expanding
it into an unused area in Building 1.
When I first came aboard in 1979 we had extensive building and fire
code violations that had to be cleared up. It seemed like we were
constantly constructing and reconstructing the buildings almost all
the time.
After Building 7, we added Buildings 8, 9, 10 & 11 to the Santa Clara campus.
Concurrently we were dealing with several governmental agencies over
some ground water contamination that had taken place over the years
under the Sunnyvale campus. Some of this contamination was the result
of MMI's previous activities but a large part of the contamination had
migrated downstream form National Semiconductor's facility across a
field and the Central Expressway from us.
I would be happy to hear from others about these days at MMI
Fred Robinson
=========================================================
Tom Branch memories - Part 4
With such a big emphasis on holding our costs down during the recession,
some suggestions were made to take some of the large customers away from
our Rep sales team and "taking the account direct." I believed then
and even more now that one of the key reasons for MMI's success was our
Rep sales force. They brought stability in the field. Reps don't care
about being promoted or moving to another territory. They sell a
broad spectrum of products to the same customers year after year.
They establish relationships with every level at our customers
from engineering to finance to purchasing, and all they ask is to
be fairly paid for the work they have done.
During this time, we established a Rep Council. It included the
presidents or owners of the Sales Reps in all of MMI's key market
areas. We met quarterly, and we treated them like any other key
employee. They met not only with me and my sales guys, but also were
given the opportunity to speak privately with Irwin, Mike Callahan,
and anyone else in our management who they wanted to. By establishing
this open line of communication, we all were sure to be pulling in the
same direction. When the sales went down and costs were critical to
all of us, we jointly decided to reduce the Rep commission rate from
5% to 4%, a 20 % cost savings to MMI at a critical time.
To insure fairness, however, we imposed the 4% rate on each Rep's
sales up to the sales number he had done the previous year. Once he
reached that number, all sales for the rest of the year were paid
at a rate of 6% [for example if Rep had $1 million in sales for 1982,
he was paid 4% or $40,000 for the first million in sales for 1983.
If he ended up selling $ 2 million for 1983, he would be paid 6%
or $60,000 for the second million of sales.]
Why is this important? Because it helped both parties. It helped MMI
increase cash flow which was key in those times, yet since we didn't
take any house accounts, the Reps still got compensated for the job
they had done, and further, if they did an exceptional job, they had
the opportunity to earn even more than they would have with a fixed
commission rate. It was a big factor in allowing us to maintain
continuity with our customers, at time when our competition was laying
off 20 to 40 % of their direct sales force. It gave us what we called
an "unfair share of mind" both with our Reps and our customers,
which eventually paid huge dividends for us all.
So we kept our heads down and focused on getting more and more designs
for the existing product line. At the same time, we had begun to add
additional products like TTL, LS TTL, 8 bit interface products and our
first proprietary bipolar FIFO [first in, first out] devices, the 67401,
which would end up, after a few years, as one of our most profitable
products.
In our fiscal 1983 beginning in October of 1982, we began another wonderful
ride up the mountain, after licking our wounds in the economic valley of
despair for 18 to 24 months. We ended the year with sales of $105 million,
up from $68.5 in 1982. More importantly, our profits went from a
respectable $2.8 million in 1982 to a robust $10.2 million in 1983!!!
With the overall economy ticking upward, we took the opportunity to
issue two additional stock offerings, which added $59 million cash
to our balance sheet. We had put ourselves in the position to not only
expand our product lines into the fast growing CMOS market, but to
consider acquiring other technologies and company's as time went on.
1984 was not the Hades that George Orwell predicted. We were on a role
and kept building the momentum as the year progressed. Our product line
was expanding in a number of directions. We had signed an agreement
with Motorola to produce ECL logic devices. We also agreed with Fujitsu
to second source their high-speed TTL gate arrays, expanding our
coverage of the semicustom market. We also signed technology agreements
with Cypress semiconductor and Xilinx, who used our state of the art
fab areas to develop their products in exchange for cash and stock in
their companies, further strengthening our financial condition. All
this was in addition to adding more complex and flexible products to
our Pal device line, to the tune of 34 new product introductions during
the year.
We also split out the Military Products Group into a division, with
Gordon Peterson heading it and Marybeth Rotermund joining us as Marketing
manager. Tim Propeck joined as Vice President of Marketing, Mercer Curtis
joined us as Managing Director of our manufacturing facility in Penang,
Malaysia, and John Bolger came in as VP of Finance when Bill Wall left
to follow a different career.
Sales numbers in 1984 grew to $187.3 million, an increase of 78% over
our excellent 1983 results!! We showed a net profit of $26.9 million,
over twice as much as 1983! The results were among the very best in
the entire semiconductor industry for that time period. Our optimism
for the year-end results was tempered, however by a slowing down of
the order rate in the third and fourth quarter of 1984. Our huge
backlog had carried us for the entire year, but the clouds were indeed
looking a little darker going into 1985. One thing about our crazy
semiconductor business. You can't ever start to believe your own %$#%^,
because new challenges are always just around the corner!
After living through the recession of 1981 and 1982, we were grateful
and elated by the results of 1983 and 1984, but it was obvious that
the market was making another adjustment, but how much of an adjustment
and for how long were a point of conjecture. So, what did we do?
The answer was to get back to the basics. We continued to develop new
products; we pulled back on all unnecessary spending, but continued to
invest in our technology, our products, and most importantly, our people.
During the boom years, customers had also enjoyed rapidly growing
markets and in an effort to increase their own market shares, had
put into place very large inventories that would allow them to achieve
their objectives. As their sales growth rate slowed, they made
adjustments in their purchasing habits, choosing to work their
inventories down and buying only for immediate requirements, hence
the entire semiconductor industry, including MMI saw another decline,
at first in order rate, then as time went on, increasing price
erosion exacerbated the problem.
Our fiscal 1985, ending in September had seen orders continuing to
slide and backlog was following. As a result, for only the second
time, our sales decreased from year to year. Our 1984 sales of
$187 million dropped in 1985 to $177.7 million, however because of
our discipline in controlling costs, we still showed a net profit
of $10.5 million, an excellent performance relative to our competitors!
One of the reasons that we showed above average during these tough
times was due to our customer relationships. Our Rep Sales force aided
in great measure by our customer service and Inside Sales group kept
customers happy to do business with us. We had built solid relationships
over the years due to the stability and low turnover both in Rep
Salesmen and our Inside Sales group. Customers knew what to expect
from us in terms of delivery commitments and competitive pricing during
tough times.
Our relationships with IBM and Apple Computer in the U.S. indeed prospered
even in the down markets. As some customers started to outsource
manufacturing to Europe and the Far East, our sales force there kept
our momentum growing. International sales, as a percentage of total
sales grew from 23% in 1984 to 31% in 1985.
The Inside Sales group, headed for a number of years by Pauline Curiel,
then later by Bill Schallenberg, were bright and very responsive to
our customers. This was a long list of professionals and very important
to our success. They included:
Sherry Gray
Diane Scrempos
Laura Lutz [whose name miraculously changed to Laura Branch!]
Diane McGowan
Laurie Loblis
Erna Box
Kathy Richards
Mark Gouldsberry
Cheryl Garcia
Nancy Gebauer
Ray Lett
Norm Lee
Jan Hoosier
Patty Waldbillig
Dan Medler
Dee Patterson
Jackie Thomas
Rhonda Rangle
These folks interfaced not only with our Reps and customers, but also
coordinated price quotes with product marketing, who included:
Dan Medler
Jim Fahey
Andy Robin
Steve Donovan
Saeed Kazmi
I'd like to make a special note here to some of the Rep individuals
who made consistent major contributions to MMI over the years.
Lloyd Mullin, Bruce Tarpley, Frank Collins-Boston
Ken Thomas, Paul Pagnini---San Jose
Jim Roney, Ernie Swinarski-Atlanta and Huntsville
Mike Bagramian-L.A.
Dave West, Tom Flemmons-Dallas
Bruce Anderson, Brian Alley-Chicago
Ron Makin, Fritz Kaiser-Ohio
Skip Greiner-Detroit
Bill Wyckoff---Denver
Giuseppe Cali---Comprel Italy
(To be continued...)
=========================================================
Please send in your ideas for ways to make the MMI Alumni site more
useful.
Never say die News Editor - Millie Clark
Chief Cook & Bottle Washer - Dan Kinsella dankinsella (at) mmialumni.com
MMI Alumni web page http://www.mmialumni.com/
MMI News page http://www.mmialumni.com/news.htm
MMI messages http://128.121.189.120/mmialumni/messenger.asp
========================================================
I'd like to thank all those who have been spreading this around, and
encourage everyone to send this to MMIers that are not on the list. Have
them email me with their name, e-mail address, and where they are
currently working. (dankinsella(at)mmialumni.com)
========================================================
Quote for the month -
The best way to predict the future is to create it.
Peter F. Drucker
========================================================
For those interested -
"FLAMEs (Former Loyal Advanced Micro Employees) is the official
association of exAMDers. Please check our "FLAMEsite"
http://www.flamesite.org/
and, if you wish to join, drop me a line: jmckean (at) rogers.com