SK Hynix Overtakes Micron to Become No. 3 in NAND Flash Memory

Wednesday, August 14th, 2013

SEOUL, KOREA- SK Hynix has become a No. 3 producer in NAND flash memory chips overtaking Micron Technology Inc. of the United States.This is largely due to the company's concentrated investment in the NAND flash area for which it has been weak in comparison with the DRAM business. Last year, SK Hynix purchased Link A Media Devices (LAMD), a company specializing in controllers with NAND technology portfolios, followed by the takeover of Innostor Technology Corp., a Taiwanese company with a strength in embedded multimedia card (eMMC) technology.

On August 13, Taiwanese market research firm DRAMeXchange said that SK Hynix took a No. 3 spot in the second quarter in the NAND flash market with a 14.6-percent share, after Samsung Electronics (37.8%) and Toshiba (28.7%). Micron Technology, the erstwhile No. 3 player, was ranked No. 4 with a share of 11.7 percent. SK Hynix could increase its share by 3.7 percentage points within only six months from an 11.9-percent share last year.

The global NAND flash sales for the second quarter came to US$5.78 billion, up 11.2 percent from the previous quarter and more than 30 percent from the same period last year, according to DRAMeXchange.