Favorable Environment
According to DRAMeXchange, the average selling price (ASP) of 4Gb DDR3 chips rose 6% from the previous month to US$2.6 in November this year. “The price continued to rise after having soared by 25.3% in October to show the highest rate of increase in three years and seven months,” the market research firm explained.
Likewise, the ASP of 4Gb DDR4 chips rose by 2% in November and that of 4GB DRAM modules for PCs rose by 2.86% month-on-month to US$18 during the same period. The price is estimated to reach US$20 in the first quarter of next year. The DRAM price began to rise in July this year after a 21 month-long downtrend.
At present, Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix are enjoying a combined market share of 74% or so in the global DRAM market. Their share amounts to 87% in the mobile DRAM market. In the third quarter of this year, Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix posted a quarter-on-quarter sales increase of 22.4% and 8.6%, respectively.
The semiconductor division of Samsung Electronics is estimated to record an operating profit of at least four trillion won (US$3.6 billion) in the fourth quarter of 2016 alone and more than three trillion won (US$2.7 billion) out of the total is predicted to be derived from its DRAM business.