The memory crisis, a true blessing for electronic components producers
The launch of the iPhone 8 in autumn this year, the tenth ”reincarnation” of the famous Apple smartphone, creates a true crisis on the memory market due to increased component demand.
If this strongly affects smartphone producers, which now need to pay more for memories and anticipate their orders, this is a true blessing for memory producers.
One of these winners is Micron Technology, the world’s largest RAM memory producer. The company reported $5,56 bln in revenue and $1,64 bln in profit in the last trimester. By comparison, the company had $4,64 bln in revenue and a net profit of only $894 mln the previous trimester.
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At the same time last year, the company had half the revenue and $215 mln in losses.
Around 60% of Micron revenue comes from DRAM memories, and their price increased by 14% in the past trimester.
Sanjay Mehrotra, head of Micron, declared that he expects the “healthy” demand to persist in 2018, reflecting the trend in data centre sector and mobile devices market.
Micron stocks increased by 44% this year.
The company further announced that it saw an increase in the demand for chips integrated in automobiles.
The mute battle
Micron Technology became the largest RAM memory producer after it took over Elpida Memory in 2013, the world’s third largest specialized chip producer at the moment. Another strong competitor in the sector is South-Korean producer SK Hynix.
Chips are also used for storage, but these are called NAND memories. Samsung is the world leader here, with Toshiba being second.
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Toshiba is about to sell its memory division to a consortium lead by a Japanese state fund, but which also includes American investment fund Bain Capital and SK Nhynix. Furthermore, Western Digital also made an offer alongside another American fund, KKR & Co.
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