Nasdaq Stocks Tiptoe into Asia

Electronic News, June 12, 2000 by Carol Haber

As the trend toward a 24-hour global trading system speeds ahead, seven Nasdaq National Market-listed companies, most of them high-tech-related, began trading on the Stock Exchange of Hong Kong (SEHK) in a pilot program. The companies have strong interests in Asia and represent an array of high-tech sectors. They include Applied Materials Inc., a wafer fabrication equipment maker; Cisco Systems Inc., a networking specialist; Dell Computer Corp., a direct sales provider of PCs; Intel Corp., the microprocessor heavyweight; and Microsoft Corp., the software legend. "We hope to learn what works and what doesn't," said John T. Wall, Nasdaq International's president. "We'll be watching to see how investor interest develops." The program should reduce Hong Kong investors' transaction costs in dealing with U.S. equities, and is the first pilot program to allow Nasdaq stocks to be quoted for trading in an Asian time zone exchange. Nasdaq shares are being admitted for trading only and are not "listed" on SEHK. They will be quoted and traded in Hong Kong dollars. The companies will continue to be committed to complying with all Nasdaq requirements. "The development of a liquid market in Hong Kong for global stocks will help to establish it as an integral part of a 24-hour global trading market linking the Asian, European and U.S. time zones," said Charles Lee, SEHK chairman. Nonindustry-related pilot participants are Amgen Corp. and Starbucks Coffee Co., with the latter sure to benefit from the added coffee investors will need while trading worldwide and round the clock.

No Wires at Intersil

Intersil Corp., Palm Bay, Fla., wrapped its acquisition of Bilthoven, Netherlands-based No Wires Needed B.V. (NWN) in an all-stock transaction. Intersil's goal is to expand its presence in the wireless LAN market. The company is the former semiconductor division of Harris Corp. It was spun out in August of 1999 and had an IPO in late February. "Our strategy is to provide wireless semiconductor and software architectures to support the growing demand for high-speed wireless network connectivity in homes and offices," said Greg Williams, Intersil chief executive officer. Technological assets from the NWN acquisition include a very small, high-performance wireless to broadband "access point" reference design easily adapted for home gateway products.

MIPS Move

The board of MIPS Technologies Inc., Mountain View, Calif., adopted a shareholder rights plan. Under the plan, MIPS will issue a dividend of one right for each share of common stock, par value of $0.001 per share of the company held by stockholders of record as of the close of business on June 19. The plan is designed to assure stockholders fair value in the event of a future unsolicited business combination or similar transaction involving the company.