The recent fire at SK Hynix's factory in China has resulted in decreased global supply of PC-use DRAM, which is likely to encourage Samsung Electronics to increase PC-use DRAM output, according to industry sources.

Starting around late 2012 , Samsung has shifted its DRAM business focus to chips used in mobile devices from commodity chips for PCs. Market observers previously estimated that PC DRAM would account for as low as 20% of Samsung's overall DRAM output in 2013.

The latest data from DRAMeXchange show that Samsung already placed a heavy emphasis on growing its mobile DRAM business. Samsung accounted for 50.3% of the global mobile DRAM market in the second quarter of 2013, followed by SK Hynix with a 25.7% share.

Meanwhile, Samsung's global DRAM market share slipped 5.1pp sequentially to 32.7% in the second quarter, while second-ranked SK Hynix saw its share increase 3.5pp on quarter to 30%, according to DRAMeXchange.

An industry estimate indicates that production of as high as 130,000 wafers, which consist of about 100,000 wafers for PC DRAM and 30,000 wafers for mobile DRAM, has been affected at the SK Hynix fire-hit plant in Wuxi, China.

SK Hynix said on September 13 that the company expects to restore full operations at its fire-affected plant in October. "We plan to complete inspections and full restoration of the air ventilation system and facilities in order to resume production in October. Further, we will make every effort to ramp up operations in stages in order to fully recover normalized production level in November," Seongae Park with the company's Public Relations Team said in a statement.

DRAM spot market prices have risen due to concerns over supply constraints. Spot prices for 2Gb and 4Gb DDR3 chips have rallied to approach US$2 and US$4, respectively.

By: DocMemory
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