El Segundo, Calif. — The average amount of DRAM used in smart phones is poised to grow by more than a factor of 10 over the next several years, growing to 1.3 Gbytes by 2014, up from 123 Mbytes in 2009, according to iSuppli Corp. The market researcher says the recent acquisitions by DRAM suppliers Elpida and Micron indicate the growing importance by suppliers to offer a complete portfolio of memory products for the smart-phone market.
“Mobile customers usually purchase memory in Multi Chip Packages (MCPs) that include both mobile DRAM and some non-volatile memory such as NOR or NAND,” said Mike Howard, senior analyst for DRAM at iSuppli Corp., in a statement.
He added: “This makes it essential to have a complete portfolio of memory products in order to compete in the mobile market. Thus, it shouldn’t be that much of a shock that after Micron announced it was going to purchase NOR flash memory heavyweight Numonyx, Elpida followed with news that it would be acquiring a significant portion of Spansion’s flash memory assets.”
Elpida, which doesn’t manufacture NOR or NAND, has had to rely on its competitors for parts to compete in the mobile memory market, but by buying Spansion’s assets it should have more control over its supply and design chains in the future, stated Howard.
For more information, click here for Howard’s report, “Memory Consolidation Continues—Elpida Purchases Spansion Assets.”