Contract prices for NAND flash memory continued to hold flat in the first half of February. Prices for late January turned soft after having rallied in the former part of the month.
NAND flash contract prices, after having declined about 17% during the fourth quarter of 2010, would rebound mildly in the first quarter of 2011. But prices may trend downwards in the second quarter due to the traditionally slow season.
NAND flash contract prices would come down slightly in the second quarter.
The sources also pointed out that the second quarter seems like a good time of year for them to stock up at low-enough prices. As chipmakers usually give priority to their system customers, downtream module houses and channel distributors will need to pre-stock inventory for arbitrage before the system makers replenish their inventory and push chip prices up.
Rising smartphone and tablet PC demand will play a key role in driving NAND flash prices in 2011, the sources said.
However, some other industry sources expressed concerns that chip producers' process advancement and capacity ramp-ups could put downward pressure on NAND flash prices later this year.
Samsung Electronics, Toshiba, Hynix Semiconductor and Micron Technology are all set to migrate to their 20-class node technologies in 2011. In addition, Samsung, Toshiba and Micron are scheduled to open their new 12-inch fabrication facilities for NAND-chip production in the second half of the year.