• Welcome to TechPowerUp Forums, Guest! Please check out our forum guidelines for info related to our community.

Micron and Kioxia are Cutting Back on DRAM and NAND Manufacturing Volumes

TheLostSwede

News Editor
Joined
Nov 11, 2004
Messages
17,614 (2.41/day)
Location
Sweden
System Name Overlord Mk MLI
Processor AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D
Motherboard Gigabyte X670E Aorus Master
Cooling Noctua NH-D15 SE with offsets
Memory 32GB Team T-Create Expert DDR5 6000 MHz @ CL30-34-34-68
Video Card(s) Gainward GeForce RTX 4080 Phantom GS
Storage 1TB Solidigm P44 Pro, 2 TB Corsair MP600 Pro, 2TB Kingston KC3000
Display(s) Acer XV272K LVbmiipruzx 4K@160Hz
Case Fractal Design Torrent Compact
Audio Device(s) Corsair Virtuoso SE
Power Supply be quiet! Pure Power 12 M 850 W
Mouse Logitech G502 Lightspeed
Keyboard Corsair K70 Max
Software Windows 10 Pro
Benchmark Scores https://valid.x86.fr/yfsd9w
According to a TrendForce investigations, memory pricing began to decline from 4Q21 due to weakening demand for certain consumer electronics. Coupled with the impact of rising inflation, the Russian-Ukrainian war, and pandemic policies, demand in peak season was weak, resulting in inventory pressure that has extended from the buyer side to manufacturers. In response to the aforementioned situation, Micron announced last week that it would cut production of DRAM and NAND Flash, becoming the first major memory manufacturer to officially reduce its capacity utilization plan. In terms of NAND Flash, the market situation is more severe than that of DRAM. As the average contract price of mainstream capacity wafers has fallen to their cash cost and is approaching the periphery of selling at a loss for various manufacturers, Kioxia also announced that it will reduce NAND Flash capacity utilization by 30% from October on the heels of Micron's announcement.

In terms of DRAM, current contract pricing remains higher than the total production cost of various mainstream suppliers. Therefore, compared with NAND Flash, it remains to be seen whether there will be a significant reduction in production. In addition to mentioning the slight reduction in capacity utilization in this sector currently, Micron mainly emphasized its sharp downward revision of capital expenditures in 2023 and that the annual growth of DRAM production bits next year will only be around 5%. TrendForce believes, according to Micron, to actualize such conservative bit growth means that there is still room for a significant downward revision in capacity utilization and the extent to which Micron's subsequent production reductions are implemented remains to be seen.




In terms of NAND Flash, Micron originally planned to gradually increase its proportion of 232-layer products from 4Q22. However, with the implementation of the company's decision to reduce production, Micron's mainstream processes are estimated to remain dominated by 176-layer products in 2023, while wafer starts in legacy processes will also fall. Kioxia and WDC originally planned to migrate to 162-layer products starting in 4Q22 but WDC slowed CapEx in 2023. When funding is hard to come by and demand visibility poor, the proportion of 162-layer products will fall greatly and the company's original plan to replace mainstream 112-layer products in 2023 will not be achieved.

More manufactures limiting bit output cannot be ruled out as only large-scale production reduction can reverse supply/demand imbalance in 2023
After analyzing 2023 supply and demand in the memory market, due to a conservative demand outlook, DRAM and NAND Flash look to be greatly oversupplied in each quarter and inventory pressure will continue to accelerate in 1H23. In the DRAM sector, after Micron led the way to announce a DRAM production reduction plan that will fall far below historical levels of supply-side bit growth, the 2023 DRAM Sufficiency Ratio will contract from the 11.6% previously forecast by TrendForce to less than 10%, helping to alleviate rapidly deteriorating inventory pressure. However, more suppliers must be relied on to join in the actual reduction of DRAM production in the future in order to reverse the supply and demand imbalance next year.

It is imperative to reduce bit supply in the NAND Flash field due to the large number of competitors and the fact that manufacturers have yet to encroach on the physical limits of manufacturing. Considering that supply-side bit growth from Micron and Kioxia has been downgraded, the 2023 NAND Flash Sufficiency Ratio will drop significantly from the original estimate of 10.1% to 5.6%. Under the expectation that more NAND Flash suppliers will join the ranks reducing production due to loss considerations, inventory pressure is expected to ease in the 2Q23, while price declines are expected to diminish in 2H23.

View at TechPowerUp Main Site | Source
 
Joined
Dec 14, 2011
Messages
1,035 (0.22/day)
Location
South-Africa
Processor AMD Ryzen 9 5900X
Motherboard ASUS ROG STRIX B550-F GAMING (WI-FI)
Cooling Corsair iCUE H115i Elite Capellix 280mm
Memory 32GB G.Skill DDR4 3600Mhz CL18
Video Card(s) ASUS GTX 1650 TUF
Storage Sabrent Rocket 1TB M.2
Display(s) Dell S3220DGF
Case Corsair iCUE 4000X
Audio Device(s) ASUS Xonar D2X
Power Supply Corsair AX760 Platinum
Mouse Razer DeathAdder V2 - Wireless
Keyboard Redragon K618 RGB PRO
Software Microsoft Windows 11 - Enterprise (64-bit)
Prices going down for DDR5 and SSDs? Quick! Keep it artificially high!

Beat me to it. The only advice I can give, vote with your wallet and boycott companies that do this.
 
Joined
Apr 13, 2022
Messages
1,174 (1.23/day)
Beat me to it. The only advice I can give, vote with your wallet and boycott companies that do this.

You can't really. The critical components companies that make the stuff that would go into all the end products we buy will see their profits contract and then all cut back to keep those profits.
 
Joined
Sep 15, 2015
Messages
1,074 (0.32/day)
Location
Latvija
System Name Fujitsu Siemens, HP Workstation
Processor Athlon x2 5000+ 3.1GHz, i5 2400
Motherboard Asus
Memory 4GB Samsung
Video Card(s) rx 460 4gb
Storage 750 Evo 250 +2tb
Display(s) Asus 1680x1050 4K HDR
Audio Device(s) Pioneer
Power Supply 430W
Mouse Acme
Keyboard Trust
Joined
Feb 11, 2020
Messages
248 (0.14/day)
Where I live, DRAM stocks have been sparse for the last year. The selection is shit and prices high. I've been waiting for stocks to return and prices to go back down again.

Supply chains have a case of long-Covid me thinks.
 
Joined
Jan 31, 2010
Messages
5,543 (1.02/day)
Location
Gougeland (NZ)
System Name Cumquat 2021
Processor AMD RyZen R7 7800X3D
Motherboard Asus Strix X670E - E Gaming WIFI
Cooling Deep Cool LT720 + CM MasterGel Pro TP + Lian Li Uni Fan V2
Memory 32GB GSkill Trident Z5 Neo 6000
Video Card(s) Sapphire Nitro+ OC RX6800 16GB DDR6 2270Cclk / 2010Mclk
Storage 1x Adata SX8200PRO NVMe 1TB gen3 x4 1X Samsung 980 Pro NVMe Gen 4 x4 1TB, 12TB of HDD Storage
Display(s) AOC 24G2 IPS 144Hz FreeSync Premium 1920x1080p
Case Lian Li O11D XL ROG edition
Audio Device(s) RX6800 via HDMI + Pioneer VSX-531 amp Technics 100W 5.1 Speaker set
Power Supply EVGA 1000W G5 Gold
Mouse Logitech G502 Proteus Core Wired
Keyboard Logitech G915 Wireless
Software Windows 11 X64 PRO (build 23H2)
Benchmark Scores it sucks even more less now ;)
Well that didn't take long for these companies to adjust to maintain profits.
Atleast it wasn't some BS earthquake or fire or flood or power outage malarky now they just don't give a shit and have told the truth about rising prices
 
Joined
Apr 12, 2013
Messages
7,528 (1.77/day)
Where I live, DRAM stocks have been sparse for the last year. The selection is shit and prices high. I've been waiting for stocks to return and prices to go back down again.

Supply chains have a case of long-Covid me thinks.
If you're talking about DDR4 that's unlikely to happen, the volumes will continue to go down as industries switch over to DDR5 & then the major DRAM makers will reduce inventory & shift their fabs to making mostly DDR5 over the next few years. If you were talking about DDR5 then of course prices will go only one way ~ down, in the medium to long term.
 
Joined
Feb 11, 2020
Messages
248 (0.14/day)
In the meantime, low availability continues to persist. Which, in turn, dampens the demand.
 
Joined
Apr 8, 2012
Messages
270 (0.06/day)
Location
Canada
System Name custom
Processor intel i7 9700
Motherboard asrock taichi z370
Cooling EK-AIO 360 D-RGB
Memory 24G Kingston HyperX Fury 2666mhz
Video Card(s) GTX 2080 Ti FE
Storage SSD 960GB crucial + 2 Crucial 500go SSD + 2TO crucial M2
Display(s) BENQ XL2420T
Case Lian-li o11 dynamic der8auer Edition
Audio Device(s) Asus Xonar Essence STX
Power Supply corsair ax1200i
Mouse MX518 legendary edition
Keyboard gigabyte Aivia Osmium
VR HMD PSVR2
Software windows 11
Prices going down for DDR5 and SSDs? Quick! Keep it artificially high!
Bro they need money to build those big farm in US and EU .

all i see in news is micro are about to build farm here and here and here..

CHIP act!
 
Joined
Feb 1, 2019
Messages
3,590 (1.69/day)
Location
UK, Midlands
System Name Main PC
Processor 13700k
Motherboard Asrock Z690 Steel Legend D4 - Bios 13.02
Cooling Noctua NH-D15S
Memory 32 Gig 3200CL14
Video Card(s) 4080 RTX SUPER FE 16G
Storage 1TB 980 PRO, 2TB SN850X, 2TB DC P4600, 1TB 860 EVO, 2x 3TB WD Red, 2x 4TB WD Red
Display(s) LG 27GL850
Case Fractal Define R4
Audio Device(s) Soundblaster AE-9
Power Supply Antec HCG 750 Gold
Software Windows 10 21H2 LTSC
During the price basement I was tempted to push my proxmox/nas machine to 64 gigs over its current 32, I ended up not doing it and the ship has sailed now, DDR4 will probably never go as cheap again.

For gaming PCs VRAM is starting to become more important than DRAM due to developers moving things over to use VRAM in their games.
 
Joined
Jul 5, 2013
Messages
27,744 (6.67/day)
Beat me to it. The only advice I can give, vote with your wallet and boycott companies that do this.
What you fail to understand is that if companies don't scale back production they could cause devaluation to their own product and cause a situation were it costs more to make those products than they can sell those products for. It is not only good for business short term, but a way to protect their long term interests. As detailed below;
It is imperative to reduce bit supply in the NAND Flash field due to the large number of competitors and the fact that manufacturers have yet to encroach on the physical limits of manufacturing. Considering that supply-side bit growth from Micron and Kioxia has been downgraded, the 2023 NAND Flash Sufficiency Ratio will drop significantly from the original estimate of 10.1% to 5.6%. Under the expectation that more NAND Flash suppliers will join the ranks reducing production due to loss considerations, inventory pressure is expected to ease in the 2Q23, while price declines are expected to diminish in 2H23.

Manufacturing Economics 101.
 
Joined
Dec 14, 2011
Messages
1,035 (0.22/day)
Location
South-Africa
Processor AMD Ryzen 9 5900X
Motherboard ASUS ROG STRIX B550-F GAMING (WI-FI)
Cooling Corsair iCUE H115i Elite Capellix 280mm
Memory 32GB G.Skill DDR4 3600Mhz CL18
Video Card(s) ASUS GTX 1650 TUF
Storage Sabrent Rocket 1TB M.2
Display(s) Dell S3220DGF
Case Corsair iCUE 4000X
Audio Device(s) ASUS Xonar D2X
Power Supply Corsair AX760 Platinum
Mouse Razer DeathAdder V2 - Wireless
Keyboard Redragon K618 RGB PRO
Software Microsoft Windows 11 - Enterprise (64-bit)
What you fail to understand is that if companies don't scale back production they could cause devaluation to their own product and cause a situation were it costs more to make those products than they can sell those products for. It is not only good for business short term, but a way to protect their long term interests. As detailed below;


Manufacturing Economics 101.

Ahem, no, how to "F" the end user 101.

I only see record profits being made each time, wonder why...
 

Count von Schwalbe

Moderator
Staff member
Joined
Nov 15, 2021
Messages
3,069 (2.78/day)
Location
Knoxville, TN, USA
System Name Work Computer | Unfinished Computer
Processor Core i7-6700 | Ryzen 5 5600X
Motherboard Dell Q170 | Gigabyte Aorus Elite Wi-Fi
Cooling A fan? | Truly Custom Loop
Memory 4x4GB Crucial 2133 C17 | 4x8GB Corsair Vengeance RGB 3600 C26
Video Card(s) Dell Radeon R7 450 | RTX 2080 Ti FE
Storage Crucial BX500 2TB | TBD
Display(s) 3x LG QHD 32" GSM5B96 | TBD
Case Dell | Heavily Modified Phanteks P400
Power Supply Dell TFX Non-standard | EVGA BQ 650W
Mouse Monster No-Name $7 Gaming Mouse| TBD
I read another piece expecting NAND and DRAM pricing to fall over 30%. If that is true, those companies will be losing money on each and every piece they sell. Unless you want a bunch of them to go out of business, it is foolish to fault them for reducing production of, essentially, debt.
 
Joined
Feb 11, 2020
Messages
248 (0.14/day)
I just wish they'd get something decent on the shelves that we can buy. Only parts available is the dross.
 
Top