Skymedi, a Taiwan-based design house of NAND flash controller ICs, will begin listing on the Taiwan over-the-counter (OTC) bourse on November 8 at NT$65 per share.
Samsung Electronics is the largest shareholder of Skymedi with a stake of 16.4%, while memory module supplier Kingston Technology and Intel Capital holds 6.2% and about 3% stakes respectively. Samsung is also Skymedi's largest client, accounting for 90% of the latter's revenues.
With SD card controller ICs accounting for 90% of revenues currently, Skymedi expects to ship about 250 million such ICs in 2011 and has shifted to TLC (triple-level cell) as mainstream technology and upgrading process from 32nm to 27nm.
In addition, Skymedi has stepped into development and production of eMMC and SSD (solid-state drive) controller ICs and has entered supply chains of BBK Communication Technology, a China-based vendor of educational electronic devices, Japan-based Nintendo and Micron Technology for eMMC controller ICs. For SSD controller ICs, Skymedi looks to growing demand for use in tablet and Ultrabook PCs.
Skymedi currently cooperates with Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company for foundry service and Taiwan-based King Yuan Electronics for IC testing. Skymedi recorded revenues of NT$2.11 billion (US$74 million), gross margins of 45.37%, net profit of NT$323 million and net earnings per share of NT$6.11 for January-September 2011.