The price of the memory bar behind: semiconductor oligarchs are turning

Editor's note: This article from the Economic Observation network, the author Shen Yi, 36 Krypton was authorized to release.

According to the latest data, global memory industry output is approaching 20% this year, below the level of recent years. Spot market prices are fierce this month, in the memory included in the PC memory, server memory, mobile memory three major product categories, the price increases are mainly concentrated in PC memory.

PC memory is in the unprecedented price rally, the current DDR 4G contract price of only 30 U.S. dollars, but the spot price has reached 42-43 U.S. dollars, in the short term such a situation will continue.

As an oligopoly market, the price of memory strips soared behind, Samsung Electronics, the United States Optical Technology, SK Heidelberg Memory vendors are undergoing a more consistent strategic change: they have to move capacity to the more profitable server memory and operational memory business, while the memory bar manufacturers will give priority to HP, Dell, such as the needs of large customers , do not care about the spot market price, so the formation of this round of soaring prices.

Set state Consulting forecast, next year, the memory industry is still dominated by the three large memory factory, capacity in the factory is unwilling to increase the situation, there is a chance to maintain the high-grade water level in the first half of next year, the memory market is still in supply tight pattern trend.

But the variables remain, and the oligarchs seem to have changed their strategy in a consistent way. Samsung Electronics and SK Rexroth are planning to expand DRAM capacity recently, which means that in 2018-2019, there will be a supply-demand balance and even oversupply in the memory market. And this is the domestic memory related manufacturers are about to achieve the initial mass production of the Key stage, the downward trend of prices are often very unfavorable to new entrants. Such a pattern, domestic manufacturers want to occupy a place in the world, I am afraid it will take 3-5 years. Strategic change

Profit Pursuit is the direct reason for the strategic change of the three companies. From the product gross profit margin, compared to the 30-40% gross profit level of PC memory, the operational memory and server memory gross profit margin has reached 50-60%. One of the mobile memory for smartphones, in the global market stock has always maintained the current level, and server memory applications more extensive, with the development of emerging markets, server memory will usher in a broader market prospects.

The strategic change of oligarchs, for HP, Dell and other big brand manufacturers will not have an impact, because upstream will be the priority to meet the needs of large customers, and the small and medium-sized brand is very unfavorable. At the same time, the price will certainly be transmitted to consumers, but the consumer is not sensitive to the PC machine price, the real impact is to assemble their own PC consumers.

According to official sources, Samsung plans to set up a plant in Pyongtaek to expand DRAM capacity, and on October 29, SK Rexroth announced that it would expand DRAM capacity in Wuxi, China, and the expansion plans of the oligarchs are likely to ease the trend of the continued rise in PC memory prices.

In terms of specific influence, as the production line of SK Heidelberg has just been built, it is expected to produce at least 1.5, and Samsung Electronics in the Pyongtaek production line has been built ready to start the state. This means that Samsung's expansion plan will be a key factor in reversing the rise in memory prices. Critical moment

From Samsung's strategy to see there are two possible future, the first one, the expansion of capacity is enough to fill the current demand gap, so will ease the current round of rising prices; second, plans to expand capacity, then the second half of next year, PC memory prices will be a downward trend. Samsung Electronics is still a variable because it has not publicly disclosed plans to scale up its expansion.

If Samsung adopts a second strategy, it may be detrimental to the rising domestic semiconductor manufacturers, because 2018-2019 is the key period of the domestic storage industry, under the "Purple Light" of the Yangtze River storage, Hefei Chang Xin and Fujian Jinhuagong, three of these manufacturers, is expected to achieve initial mass production in this time period. For semiconductors such a high input industry, the new entrants are bound to lose money, but in the downward stage of prices into the market, means to pay higher costs.

From the current domestic manufacturers in the progress of the 3-5 years, it is difficult to create a threat to the oligarchs. In the course of our investigation, the construction progress of these factories still lags behind the forecast. They are also aware of the difficulty of the industry, not only financial support can achieve the goal, the more important hurdle is intellectual property.

For the memory industry, so far the development of thirty or forty years, a product of all the modules and components have strict intellectual property rights protection, playing patent war is already a common means of market competition. For new entrants, the only thing that can be done is early mass production, to expand their own strength to do a good job, only qualified and original negotiations.

(the author is a state consulting semiconductor research Center (Dramexchange) research deputy Guo Zuorong, this reporter Shen Yijan interview collation)