Monthly Memory & Flash Market Watch
September 2024
Samsung in mass production of LPDDR5X DRAM packages for on-device AI
• The 12nm ultra-slim DRAM sets a new standard for high-performance on-device AI solutions, offering superior LPDDR performance and advanced thermal management in an ultra-compact package that can create additional space within mobile devices, therefore facilitating better airflow.
Kioxia aims to list in October in biggest IPO this year, aiming to achieve a $10.3 billion market capitalization
• The listing application comes after Kioxia and WDC decided to halt merger talks in 2023, yet the firm plans to resume talks after the listing as the move is expected to undermine SK Hynix's influence.
WD announces enterprise 128TB SSD, 8TB SD cards, and a 16TB external SSD at FMS 2024
• The BiCS8 QLC 128TB eSSD has great benefit for the data demands of AI, ML, and LLMs.
SK hynix develops 6th-gen 10nm-class DDR5 with the world's first 16Gb DRAM modules
• This 6th-gen DDR5 DRAM is an evolution over its 1b process node, which is dubbed 1c process and built on 10nm lithography. The 1c process is reportedly 11% faster than its previous-generation counterpart and 9% more energy efficient. Thanks to the power efficiency of its 6th Gen 1c process, SK hynix believes data centers’ electricity bills can be reduced by up to 30%.
Micron sampling PCIe Gen5 U.2, E1./E3.S form factors data center SSD with workload performance for AI and beyond
• The 9550 NVMe SSD is assumed to be the world’s fastest data center SSD and industry leader in AI workload performance and power efficiency: sequential R/W speed up to 14/10 GB/s, random R/W speed up to 3,300/400K IOPS, consuming up to 43% less power than comparable SSDs in AI workloads.
SUPPLY TREND
2024-2025 Worldwide SSD Shipment
WW SSD demand is expected to reach a peak in the end of 2024, and 2025 general shipping status is likely to stay above 2024’s quarterly level
2024-2025 Worldwide DRAM Output
2024-2025 NAND Price Trend & Sufficiency Ratio
maintained at a low level since 2024/B
Price Trend: NAND flash price will trend stable until 1Q25, and will experience a gradual hike in quarters afterward in demand peak seasons
2024-2025 DDR4 Price Trend & Sufficiency Ratio
DRAM Sufficiency: maintained at extreme low level throughout 2024
Price Trend: 8Gb contract price had a strong rebound in 2Q24 and another wave of hikes is possible in Q4’24. General price level has a relatively large gap from the lowest spot price level
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 BiCS5 |
● | ▂ | |
|
3D TLC (BiCS4) * Tight supply. We encourage you to migrate to BICS5. |
● | ▂ | |
| 3D TLC (BiCS5) | ● | ▂ |
●Smooth Supply ● Mildly Tight Supply ● Tight supply ▂ Flat ▲ Upward trend ▼ Downward trend
Insights
View all
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."
