Monthly Memory & Flash Market Watch
October 2023
Samsung announced its LPCAMM development that leverages LPDDR5X memory
• LPDDR5X-6400 features: 1.delivers up to 7.5Gbps memory throughput 2.consumes 60% less board space while delivering 50% more performance than regular SO-DIMM 3.could potentially be used for data centers
• The company has validated LPCAMM’s compatibility with Intel’s systems and will test systems with other major unspecified customers in 2023.
Kioxia Holdings Corp.’s lenders prep $14 billion loan for Western Digital merger
• WDC will hold about 50.5% of the combined holding company, while the remaining will be held by Kioxia under the terms of the deal being discussed.
• WDC’s hard drive business is expected to remain separate and is not part of the deal.
U.S. to prolong special permission for SK Hynix to import chipmaking tools for its Chinese fabs
• such permission does not require additional licensing and applies to Samsung as well.
• if Hynix receives grants from the U.S CHIPS & Science Act, all restrictions regarding investments in China will apply.
• U.S government made the exception to ensure sufficient memory output for American firms.
Micron’s 2024 market outlook & capex plan in its 4FQ23 report
*4FQ23 highlight: $4.01 billion (vs.$6.64 billion for 4FQ22)
• Supply: 1. industry DRAM and NAND supply growth to be below industry demand growth 2. demand at leading-edge nodes is expected to exceed the supply of Micron in fiscal and CY24
• CY24 bit demand growth projection: DRAM-exceeds long-term CAGR // NAND-near long-term CAGR
SUPPLY TREND
WW SSD Shipment
demand is likely to reach new heights 4Q23.
WW DRAM Output
NAND Flash 512Gb TLC Contract Price and Sufficiency, 2023 - 2024
NAND Sufficiency: Maintained at extreme low level from 2H23 to 2024.
Price Trend: NAND Flash price may increase slightly in Q423, and will sustain more intensive growth in 2024.
DDR4 8Gb 1G*8 3200MHz ASP and Sufficiency , 2023-2024
DRAM Sufficiency: Maintained at extreme low level starting from 4Q23.
Price Trend: 8Gb contract price will not exhibit obvious growth until Dec. 2023, and may break through spot low level in Jan.,24.
SUPPLY SIGNAL
| Type | Supply | Price | |
|---|---|---|---|
|
DRAM Module  |
DDR3 | ● | ▲ |
| DDR4 | ● | ▲ | |
| DDR5 | ● | ▲ | |
|
Flash Storage  |
SLC | ● | ▂ |
| MLC | ● | ▲ | |
|
3D TLC (BiCS3) *Limited Supply. We encourage you to migrate to BiCS4 and BiCS5 |
● | ▲ | |
| 3D TLC (BiCS4) | ● | ▲ | |
| 3D TLC (BiCS5) | ● | ▲ |
● Smooth supply ● Tight supply ▂ Flat ▲ Upward trend ▼ Downward trend
Insights
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How to Choose Industrial SSD for Medical Devices?
Medical devices are rapidly becoming more digital. From medical imaging systems, patient monitoring devices, endoscopy systems, and automated dispensing cabinets to healthcare edge gateways, an increasing number of healthcare applications must continuously record medical images, sensor data, operation logs, alarm events, and system status while supporting diagnostic and treatment workflows.
What Is an NVMe SSD?
Learn what an NVMe SSD is, how NVMe differs from SATA SSDs, and why NVMe storage is ideal for automation, industrial systems, and high-frequency data logging.
What Is ECC DRAM?
Learn what ECC DRAM is, how error correction works, and why it matters for data integrity, system stability, networking security, and mission-critical computing.
How to Choose NVR Storage: Key Factors for Efficient Surveillance Systems
NVR storage is not only about capacity planning. It also affects data integrity and long-term system reliability. For AI NVR and 24/7 recording environments, storage devices must handle heavy write workloads, RAID rebuilding, and continuous recording. As a result, choosing between HDD vs. SSD and selecting the right surveillance SSD have become critical for modern surveillance deployment.
What Is the SSD Temperature Range?
Temperature is the silent limiter of every SSD, and the SSD temperature range is both a performance spec as well as a reliability spec. Under sustained load, NVMe firmware tracks a composite temperature and will start to throttle lightly or heavily. So, write throughput drops hard and latency spikes. Heat also speeds charge leakage inside NAND, which accelerates retention loss. The effect worsens as cells age from program/erase wear. Thus, you burn endurance faster and raise data-retention trouble when the drive later remains unpowered.
Garbage Collection in Industrial SSDs: What You Need to Know
Garbage collection in SSDs is the controller's quiet cleanup job. It compacts still-valid pages into new space and erases blocks that are now mostly junk. That might sound weird until you remember NAND flash can't overwrite a programmed page. It must erase first, and erase happens at the block level, not per page. So, updates become "write elsewhere, then clean later."
