DRAM demand to stay high in 2010

TAIPEI: With end-market demand staying strong since the beginning of 2010, demand for DRAM chips will remain higher than usual during the second quarter of the year. It is expected that seasonal factors may not be a hindrance to this scenario.

A report quoting Scott Chen, vice president of the APAC Business Division of Kingston Technology, said that unit prices of DDR2 and DDR3 memory are likely to rise further even after reaching the US$3 mark. The outlook for DRAM currently rides the optimistic territory, with Microsoft Windows 7 seen playing a significant role in spurring consumer and enterprise PC replacements. The market for DRAM chips is being forecast as staying high for at least the next two years, provided that major chipmakers don’t up capacity.

Meanwhile, it is a new scene as far as NAND flash is concerned. The report added that solid-state drives (SSD) would be a lucrative area for the chip.