Memory spending cuts have begun

From the Qimonda (QI) press release:

"During the last quarter, the DRAM market saw a further drop of
more than 40 percent in standard DRAM pricing, one of the strongest
declines in a December quarter. Our previously announced measures were
executed successfully, but could not compensate for this difficult
market environment," said Kin Wah Loh, President and CEO of Qimonda
AG. "We significantly reduced our cost per bit during the quarter by
almost 20 percent based on strong bit shipment growth, productivity
improvements in manufacturing and reduced operating expenses.
Furthermore, we converted more than 50 percent of our capacities to
80nm and 75nm by the end of December. We are on track with our plans
to reach a conversion rate of 75 percent by March and 90 percent by
September 2008. In addition, we are significantly cutting our capital
expenditure plan for the current financial year by Euro 250 million."

That's a pretty big cut on a percentage basis. Negative for semicap companies with a lot of memory exposure like VSEA, LRCX, MTSN.