The  NAND flash memory market generated revenues of US$5.36 billion in the first quarter of 2011, up 9.9% from US$4.88 billion in the fourth quarter of 2010. Samsung Electronics continued to lead the market with a 36.2% share, followed by Toshiba with 35.1%.
Total NAND bit shipments rose by 13% sequentially in the first quarter, while ASPs slipped by about 3%, DRAMeXchange said. Despite sluggish retail sales for flash cards and drives as a result of seasonality, demand for system products such as smartphones and tablet PCs grew steadily.
Only Micron Technology and Intel among the world's major NAND flash producers expanded their market shares sequentially in the first quarter of 2011. Both enjoyed more than 10% sequential growth in NAND flash sales during the quarter thanks to higher bit shipments and transition to 25nm process technology.
Market leader Samsung enjoyed a more than 20% growth in NAND bit shipments in the first quarter while ASPs declined approximately 10%. Second-ranked Toshiba mildly increased its bit growth, due to a power outage at its fab in December 2010 that caused shipments to fall in January and February.