De sterke daling van de DRAM prijzen in de afgelopen weken wordt door analisten deels toegeschreven aan de leveringsproblemen bij Intel. Door de beperkte supplies van Pentium III processors is de vraag naar geheugens onverwacht afgenomen, waardoor geheugenfabrikanten hun chips niet aan de straatstenen kwijtraken. Verder blijken onverwacht hoge yields bij diverse DRAM fabrikanten een bijdrage te leveren aan de huidige overproduktie:
Satoru Oyama, senior semiconductor analyst for ABN Amro Securities Japan Ltd. (Tokyo), blamed falling DRAM prices on seasonal factors and on Intel's problems keeping up with demand for microprocessors. He said the price bottom might not be reached until April or May.[...] The Pentium III bottleneck was only one of several factors blamed for the recent DRAM dive. Unexpectedly high yields at several large suppliers have increased supplies of the chips, said Bob Eminian, vice president of marketing for Samsung Semiconductor (San Jose). Suppliers have been slow to shift capacity into alternate memory types, including Rambus, double-data-rate and PC-133, creating an oversupply of PC-100 parts, Dataquest's Handy said.
But DRAM prices could get a lift in the second half of the year due to seasonal high demand and the introduction of Windows 2000, which should boost the minimum system memory requirement to 128 Mbytes, said Oyama of ABN Amro.
Check voor meer info dit artikel van EETimes.