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DRAMeXchange, a division of TrendForce, reports that the bit output from the NAND Flash industry in 2018 turned out to be higher than expected, as suppliers had steady yields of their 64-layer 3D NAND production. NAND Flash demand, however, has remained sluggish due to the looming trade war between China and the U.S., the shortage of Intel CPUs, and the lower-than-expected sales of new iPhone devices, despite the year-end busy season.
According to The Future of Smartphone Era Webinar by WitsView, a division of TrendForce, the global smartphone market has been approaching saturation, with less room for product differentiation. Thus, smartphone makers have shifted their focus to next-generation foldable models. WitsView expects the first foldable smartphone to be launched in 2019, accounting for only 0.1% in the global smartphone market. The penetration rate is estimated to reach 1.5% in 2021.
Contract prices of DRAM products have started to slide since 4Q18, and a certain amount of DRAM contracts have now been negotiated as monthly deals, instead of quarterly ones, reports DRAMeXchange, a division of TrendForce. For some contracts, the prices have been adjusted downward twice in this November, which was very rare in the industry. The situation indicates that the OEMs now have a negative outlook on the market and the price falls are expected to enlarge in the first quarter of 2019.
According to TrendForce’s latest report on this year’s smartphone production, the total volume for 3Q18 grew by 8% from 2Q18 to around 380 million. The growth was attributed to a gradual recovery of demand in 2Q18 and the stock-up of inventories related to releases of new devices and holiday sales events. Although the latest products from Apple and Huawei continue to generate demand in the smartphone market, the sales of new iPhone XR/XS/XS Max turned out to fall short of expectation, resulting in lower shipments of iPhones. Therefore, DRAMeXchange estimates that the total production volume for 4Q18 will be roughly similar to that of 3Q18, coming to around 380 million units.
DRAMeXchange, a division of TrendForce, notes that x86 continues to be the mainstream architecture for server CPUs this year, with Intel and AMD being the market leaders. Particularly, Intel dominantly represents around 98% of the total server CPU shipments worldwide in 2018. For the next year, the market share of AMD x86 server CPUs is expected to go up to 5%, after the company’s introduction of 7nm CPUs to the market.