Already before the official start of the recruitment event, the premises have been crowded by some 400 former employees. After all, 39 employers had installed booths, offering about 200 jobs; according to other estimates up to 340 jobs.

Currently, 2035 former Qimonda employees have been transferred to a job creation company where they have the opportunity for professional training — and to seek a new job. According to sources near the company, hitherto only about 200 of them have already signed a new contract.

In the meantime, the insolvency process is continuing. While a "big solution" is still on the table, at least officially, insolvency administrator Michael Jaffé already has started to sell Qimonda's major holdings. Among them is the Advanced Mask Technology Center (AMTC) which was run jointly by microprocessor manufacturer AMD, photomask vendor Toppan and Qimonda. The latter's holdings have been acquired by AMD and Toppan, Jaffé informed. Both companies now hold 50 percent of the AMTC.

Another holding was the nanotechnology materials research center NaMLab, a joint venture of Qimonda and the Dresden Technical University. In this case, Qimonda's shares have been taken over by TU Dresden. The third major holding that has already been sold is Qimonda's stake in the Dresden Chip Academy which went to the AkaTe group, a technical training and education company, based in Leipzig (Germany).

There have been rumors about a potential management buy-out which however have failed so far to materialize, presumably for financial reasons. After all, a potential core team for such a buy-out would face high investments for the acquisition of the assets, launching costs and operating costs for a new company. According to sources inside the company, these costs could easily amount to a high triple-digit million euro figure. While some insiders contacted by press adhere to the conviction that the Dresden fab could be operated profitably if it only would be possible to bring Qimonda's Buried WordLine technology to the mass market, the insolvency administrator denied that there has been such an approach. "We certainly would be open for any serious initiative," a spokesperson of the administrator said. "But we haven't seen any."

An expert familiar with the insolvency proceedings says that the insolvency law prevents "political" prices which could facilitate a buy-out. "A one-euro solution is not feasible," he said. "This would damage the creditor's interests and be illegal. Perhaps such a solution would have been possible before the insolvency — then it would have been subject to negotiations between potential investor and shareholders instead of the creditors."

Since no large-scale solution is in sight, observers believe that some parts of the insolvent company have better chances to find an investor than others. Among the activities which are said to have good chances are Qimonda's Graphics DRAM activities and a Dresden cleanroom that has been mothballed already before the insolvency.

Qimonda's core assets such as patents and the fabs however are still in the hand of the insolvency administrator. Thus, a large-scale solution still would possible. At least theoretically.

By: DocMemory
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