2HSep. mainstream MLC NAND Flash average contract price slightly up 1~3 percent

TAIPEI, TAIWAN: The 2HSep. mainstream MLC NAND Flash average contract price slightly rose 1~3 percent due to the suppliers’ re-allocation policy by putting electronics system customers as the higher supply priority in September and October, says DRAMeXchange.
Memory card and UFD makers will be unlikely to acquire sufficient supply for inventory replenishment before the early October holidays in China. 2HSep NAND Flash contract price thus partly slightly rose and partially remained flat due to the crowd-out effect in supply allocation.

Output portion of 3Xnm process technology products from some suppliers will be gradually adjusted up in 4Q09, however, larger orders for 4Q hot season replenishment from cellular phone makers will help buffer the impact of increasing output.

Besides, September and October are traditionally regarded as the peak season for downstream vendors’ inventory replenishment toward year-end hot season. Moreover, some NAND Flash price skyrocketed near 200% or above over the past three quarters, and it won’t be favorable to downstream vendors’ promotion campaign for hot season sales in 4Q09.According to DRAMeXchange.

Recently, some memory card and UFD makers have already adopted more conservative inventory control strategy for the sake of operation risk concerns.

DRAMeXchange states that whether the tighter supply circumstance can sustain or not will be further watched from two perspectives:

a) the sales performance of memory card makers during the China early October holidays and their restock demand after the long holiday period; and
b) NAND Flash related applications’ procurement demand for year-end hot season sales for US and Europe markets after mid-October. However, DRAMeXchange expects that NAND Flash price to remain stable in the short run.