After tumbling for more than four consecutive months, prices on dynamic random access memory (DRAM) may sustain rapid decrease in the coming months, causing memory chip makers to continue losing money. Nevertheless, as the demand towards computers increases in the second half of the year, towards back-to-school season, the prices may start to rebound, according to DRAMeXchange.
Price of one 512Mb DDR2 PC2-5300 (667MHz) chip has decreased by 53% in the last twelve months from $5.21 to $2.37, which is not really negative for large DRAM manufacturers as they continually implement new manufacturing technologies and, considering that prices remained pretty high till mid-December, 2006, hardly anyone suffered from changing pricing in 2006. However, starting 2007 memory pricing has been tumbling rapidly and may soon hit the bottom. The persisting price declines have pushed DRAM makers to the verge of losing money. Migrating to more advanced fabrication processors, and boosting shipments of 1Gb chips will be two key factors in deciding how the respective DRAM makers perform in the second half of the year, according to market tracker DRAMeXchange