DDR3 chip prices continue to rise on strong demand, while demand for DDR2 has dropped significantly. Therefore, Korea-based DRAM makers have recently begun bundling sales of DDR3 modules together with DDR2 modules, in order to clean up their DDR2 inventories, according to industry sources.
Many research firms and companies have all anticipated the crossover point where shipments of DDR3 exceed DDR2 will soon draw near. As a result, DDR3 supply to the spot market is severely tight, whereas DDR2 inventories have been piling up rapidly, the sources explained.
Major Korea-based DRAM producers intend to bundle DDR3 modules with DDR2 ones, to avoid a widening price gap between the two memory standards, the sources said. The strategy is to minimize the impact stemming from the combination of DDR2 oversupply and DDR3 shortages.
Some downstream channel distributors have followed suit and deployed such bundling sales strategy, in a move to promote DDR2 memory, according to the sources.
Spot market prices for 1300MHz 1Gb DDR3 chips averaged US$3.08 on January 18 compared to US$3.01 on January 8, whereas average prices for 800MHz 1Gb DDR2 have gone down below US$2.50. DDR3 chips are now priced at a premium of more than 25% over DDR2 ones.
In the contract market, average prices for 2GB DDR2 stayed flat at US$41 in the former part of January, but the 2GB DDR3 segment rose 2-5% to average US$41.