Outlook 2009: Negative sales growth for memory

EL SEGUNDO, USA & BANGALORE, INDIA: This is a continuation of the analysis of the outlook for the global semiconductor industry in 2009, with a special focus on memory in this commentary.

A further analysis of iSuppli's top 20 rankings reveals that among the leading memory makers, Hynix has definitely turned in the worst performance.

According to Nam Hyung Kim, Director & Chief Analyst, iSuppli, DRAM sales is likely to decline by 20 percent in 2008. "Consequently, Hynix’s performance is not far from an overall challenging status considering that it also scaled the NAND flash business back dramatically," he added.

So, how much longer will it take before the memory market can finally break loose of the woeful situation it currently finds itself in!

"The memory industry inevitably will experience another negative sales growth in 2009. However, the rate of sales decline will be much lower than that of 2008, said Kim.

According to the iSuppli analyst, the year 2009 will be the third year of the memory market downturn. As a result, the "supply growth reduction will take place fast, resulting in lower price drop compared to 2008."

Lastly, what is the way forward in 2009 for DRAM, NOR and SRAM?

iSuppli expects the following sales growth in 2009 (preliminary), during 2009:

DRAM: single digit percentage sales decline; and

NAND, NOR, SRAM: they will experience mid to high teens sales decline.

Interestingly, Qimonda is also among the key strugglers in the memory market, along with Micron, Nanya and PowerChip. There have been whispers about Qimonda's possible bankruptcy as well.  However, iSuppli declined to comment on this matter.