Spot prices for PC DRAM chips are expected to continue rising over the next two months, because of a supply constraint following a fire at an SK Hynix Inc plant early this month, market researcher TrendForce Corp (集邦科技) said yesterday.
As of Thursday, concern about a chip shortage has driven spot prices up 20 percent since the fire broke out at the South Korean firm’s plant in Wuxi, Jiangsu Province, China, on Sept. 4, the Taipei-based research house said.
The spot price for mainstream DDR3 chips yesterday rose 0.64 percent to US$1.884 per unit, according to the real time pricing posted on TrendForce’s Web site.
Trendforce expects SK Hynix, the world’s No. 2 DRAM supplier, to take at least two months to restore full operation at the plant, as the fire had destroyed some key equipment in the clean room and the smoke had contaminated other machines.
“As the blaze erupted in the clean room, it will be very difficult to recover damaged manufacturing equipment in the short term,” TrendForce said in a report released yesterday.
SK Hynix has sent about 100 experts and engineers from its headquarters in Icheon, South Korea, to fix the problem, it said.
Damage like this usually takes three to six months for a full recovery, TrendForce said, citing comments from unidentified semiconductor equipment experts.
“The production disruption will impact supply of DRAM [chips] to a certain extent,” TrendForce said.
Some PC makers have turned to Samsung Electronics, Micron Technology Inc and Taiwanese chipmakers to secure their chip supply, while others are even looking to DRAM module makers for supply, the researcher said.
“A short supply could occur and limit shipments by PC makers in the fourth quarter,” TrendForce said.
SK Hynix’s Wuxi plant can churn out 130,000 DRAM wafers a month, accounting for 10 percent of the global output, it said.
TrendForce added that concern over the shortage would lend support to contract prices. The researcher originally expected contract prices to slide in the second half of this year due to weak PC demand.
Boosted by the price uptick, the stock prices of Taiwan’s major PC DRAM chipmakers Nanya Technology Corp (南亞科技) and Inotera Memories Inc (華亞科技) have soared about 16 percent and 15 percent to NT$4.20 and NT$13.50 respectively since Sept. 4.
The stock of the nation’s major DRAM module supplier, ADATA Technology Co (威剛), has also jumped about 11 percent during the period to close at NT$75.70 yesterday.
On Ireland’s blustery western seaboard, researchers are gleefully flying giant kites — not for fun, but in the hope of generating renewable electricity and sparking a “revolution” in wind energy. “We use a kite to capture the wind and a generator at the bottom of it that captures the power,” said Padraic Doherty of Kitepower, the Dutch firm behind the venture. At its test site in operation since September 2023 near the small town of Bangor Erris, the team transports the vast 60-square-meter kite from a hangar across the lunar-like bogland to a generator. The kite is then attached by a
Foxconn Technology Co (鴻準精密), a metal casing supplier owned by Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), yesterday announced plans to invest US$1 billion in the US over the next decade as part of its business transformation strategy. The Apple Inc supplier said in a statement that its board approved the investment on Thursday, as part of a transformation strategy focused on precision mold development, smart manufacturing, robotics and advanced automation. The strategy would have a strong emphasis on artificial intelligence (AI), the company added. The company said it aims to build a flexible, intelligent production ecosystem to boost competitiveness and sustainability. Foxconn
Leading Taiwanese bicycle brands Giant Manufacturing Co (巨大機械) and Merida Industry Co (美利達工業) on Sunday said that they have adopted measures to mitigate the impact of the tariff policies of US President Donald Trump’s administration. The US announced at the beginning of this month that it would impose a 20 percent tariff on imported goods made in Taiwan, effective on Thursday last week. The tariff would be added to other pre-existing most-favored-nation duties and industry-specific trade remedy levy, which would bring the overall tariff on Taiwan-made bicycles to between 25.5 percent and 31 percent. However, Giant did not seem too perturbed by the
TARIFF CONCERNS: Semiconductor suppliers are tempering expectations for the traditionally strong third quarter, citing US tariff uncertainty and a stronger NT dollar Several Taiwanese semiconductor suppliers are taking a cautious view of the third quarter — typically a peak season for the industry — citing uncertainty over US tariffs and the stronger New Taiwan dollar. Smartphone chip designer MediaTek Inc (聯發科技) said that customers accelerated orders in the first half of the year to avoid potential tariffs threatened by US President Donald Trump’s administration. As a result, it anticipates weaker-than-usual peak-season demand in the third quarter. The US tariff plan, announced on April 2, initially proposed a 32 percent duty on Taiwanese goods. Its implementation was postponed by 90 days to July 9, then
RSS