Samsung, Hynix pain deepens as price drop reflects 2008 crisis

(Bloomberg) — The memory chip industry is experiencing an historic decline in demand, with two of the worst quarterly declines since records began late last year.

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The average price of DRAM, the memory used to power phones and PCs, plunged 34.4% in the fourth quarter, compounding the 31.4% drop in the previous quarter, according to the latest figures from TrendForce . Storage memory (NAND), the main product sold to data centers and enterprise customers, fared only marginally better — and the two periods rank among the worst declines since 2006.

Most memory chip makers curbed production and delayed expansion plans in the second half of 2022 in response to a rapid slowdown in the global economy. Micron Technology Inc., SK Hynix Inc. and Kioxia Holdings Corp. announced all measures to try to stabilize the market by curbing the oversupply. Samsung Electronics Co., the world’s largest memory supplier, has so far refused to change course and is sticking to an aggressive investment plan that envisages spending more than $30 billion this year to build additional capacity.

Samsung defies the chip downturn with aggressive capital spending

Samsung is betting on long-term growth for storage products, driven by increasing adoption of storage-hungry cloud services, connected cars and artificial intelligence systems. On its recent conference call, the company said it expects the smartphone market to contract again this year, but sees AI products like ChatGPT sparking increased demand.

Samsung anticipates new memory demand from AI, ChatGPT: TOPLive

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