Spansion also added a further three million shares to the offer to take the total raised to $506.4m, before expenses. Underwriters also have an option to buy an additional five million shares to cover over-allotments.
While Spansion, which was originally owned 60% by AMD and 40% by Fujitsu Ltd, claims to be the largest supplier of NOR flash memory, this sector has been outpaced by NAND-based Flash memory products. Spansion is pinning its hopes on its MirrorBit technology, which stores two bits of data in a single memory cell and accounted for 24% of sales in its last quarter.
However, competitors can always license NROM technology from Saifun Semiconductors Ltd, which also stores two physically separated bits per cell. Spansion said it has a working proof-of-concept four bits-per-cell technology called QuadBit that would enable it to target a portion of the removable storage category.
While this technological battle is underway, Spansion is losing money heavily. In its last quarter to September 25 it lost $61.7m on sales down 0.5% at $515.6m.
