Israel’s Tower Semiconductor Ltd. announced that longtime co-chief executives Yoav Nissan-Cohen and Rafi Levin have announced their intention to resign effective June 1. No reason for the departures was given.
Nissan-Cohen and Levin also said that they have completed their main task of launching Fab 2 operations, the company's 0.18-micron and below manufacturing facility, which opened earlier this year.
"Under their direction, Tower has grown from a single-fab operation to a multi-fab, multimillion-dollar operation with the infrastructure in place to advance to the next level," said Idan Ofer, Tower's chairman of the board, in a statement.
That fab did not come without sacrifice, however. Just last week Tower announced that it had reworked the conditions of a deal with its shareholders, allowing it to focus on its new fab while postponing the need to raise cash until better market conditions arise.
The major shareholders—SanDisk, Alliance Semiconductor, Macronix International and the Israel Corp. Technologies—agreed to advance $24.2 million, with the remainder of the fifth milestone payment coming if Tower raises an aggregate of $22 million, which Tower must do before the end of 2003.
The company is also facing decreasing sales and mounting losses, as its Q4 2002 revenues fell to $15.6 million from Q3's $16.2 million on a posted Q4 net loss of $13.6 million compared to a net loss of $14.5 million in the previous quarter. — (menareport.com)
© 2003 Mena Report (www.menareport.com)
