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Leadership Profile: Sass Somekh (Part 6)

Monday, April 16, 2007 | 2 comments

After spending 23 extremely successful years with Applied Materials, Sass joined Novellus as the President. In this next segment of our interview we discuss this transition, and some of the differences he encountered between the two companies.

SM: What prompted you to leave Applied and go to Novellus? SS: I had an opportunity to become a President. I was Executive Vice President at Applied, responsible for all of the product at the company and was also a board member. The opportunity to become a President is something that I always wanted.

SM: That was not going to happen at Applied? SS: No, I don’t think so.

SM: What state was Novellas in, and to what extent did your experience at Applied carry over at Novellas? SS: I grew up at Applied, and every company has a different culture and organization. Moving to Novellus I noticed they had done a very good job being able to move from one product to another and being able to provide very high technology. Novellus’ claim to fame has always been productivity. Their motto has always been “First in Productivity”. Applied had the image of the technology innovation and the multi product line, and Novellus had the reputation of being a productivity company.

SM: There was a complete DNA difference? SS: Very much so. The point was in the high-tech business you need to provide both. If you cannot make a smaller dimension chip, nobody needs you. Once you can make a small dimension chip, because a lot of electronics are going into consumer products and size is extremely important, the question is next “how much does it cost, and how much do you produce?”. Both of these things are very important.

SM: Right. Especially as the growth market for chips is totally in consumer electronics these days.

This segment is part 6 in a 10 part series Segment 7 →
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