In June 2011, Intel’s Executive Vice President Sean Maloney introduced the chipmaker’s new Ultrabook concept at the annual Computex tradeshow in Taipei, revealing the chipmaker’s future plans for notebook product design. Intel asserted that Ultrabooks would bring about a new user experience with features such as “Always On, Always Connected” (AOAC), thin and light form factor, over 10 hours of battery life, ample performance, etc...
Due to uncertainties concerning global economic recovery, many NAND Flash suppliers are conservative towards the 1H12 market. Therefore, to strengthen cost competitiveness, 1H12 bit growth will mainly be focused on process technology migration in order to help reduce oversupply and ease the impact of price decreases on profitability. Beginning in 2H12, 300mm wafer capacity will be added according to market demand. Mainstream process technology will advance from the 2xnm class in 2H11 to the 2ynm class in 2H12. TrendForce forecasts global NAND Flash bit supply volume will grow by 70.6% YoY, from 9,181 M 16Gb equiv. in 2011 to 15,663 M 16Gb equiv...
Samsung’s mobile DRAM market share was 54%, helping Korean makers take nearly 75% of the global market. Due to the rising popularity of smartphones and tablet PCs, first-tier DRAM makers increased their mobile DRAM output ratios. With continuously strong mobile DRAM shipments, Samsung was the sole semiconductor manufacturer to remain profitable in 4Q11. As for mobile DRAM price, 4Q11 saw a 10% QoQ decrease, with LPDDR2 8Gb ASP at approximately US$17.4. As 1Q12 coincides with the traditional weak shipment season, mobile DRAM price will continue on the downtrend and is expected to decrease by 15-20%...
Negatively impacted by the uncertainty of global economic recovery, many suppliers are relatively conservative towards the 1H12 market. Thus, 1H12 bit output growth will depend mainly on process technology migration in order to strengthen cost competitiveness. New 300mm wafer capacity will be not added until 2H12, depending on the status of the market at the time, in order to close the gap between NAND flash supply and demand and reduce the impact of price decline on profitability...
The global DRAM industry’s total revenue for 3Q was approximately US$6.566 billion. Due to weak economies worldwide and a severe oversupply situation, DDR3 4GB average contract price fell from US$31 to US$19.5, a decrease of nearly 37%. DRAM makers’ total revenue decreased significantly, by 19.4% QoQ. Besides Samsung Semiconductors, all other DRAM manufacturers reported losses for 3Q. Additionally, DRAM makers actively transitioned to the 30nm-node process and the production of DDR3 4Gb chips. The sufficiency ratio for 1H12 will still be over 15%, which will stimulate capacity cuts or even mergers in the DRAM industry...
Negatively affected by worldwide economic factors, shipment performance for system products such as smartphones and tablet PCs was not as expected in 2Q11...