Taiwan-based specialists in IC testing have a positive outlook for the memory industry in 2007, although there are also some concerns around overheated prices and growing difficulties in forecasting the supply, said company executives who yesterday attended a forum organized by Advantest Taiwan.

Industry players said they have no doubts that Windows Vista will help spurring demand for memory products in 2007. Aggressively ramping up 12-inch wafer outputs, local makers are also optimistic on trends in the memory market until the end of next year, the players commented.

However, there is also an opinion that capacity expansion among memory makers may also result in some confusion among suppliers, affecting their forecasts and plans.

Advantest was cited in a Chinese-language Commercial Times report as saying the memory market to be healthy needs stability in prices for DRAM and NAND flash. Any overheat of DRAM prices or weak NAND flash price trends may stimulate makers to shift back to DRAM production, and it will result in shifting the overall supply balance.

In related news, Advantest announced the availability of its new memory test system, the T5383. According to Advantest, the new system shares the floor space requirements of the company's previous model, the T5377, but offers a 50% higher parallel test capacity and performs twice faster. The company indicated that leading memory makers from Europe and South Korea have already placed orders for the T5383, which is priced 50-80% higher than the previous model.

By: DocMemory
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