Nanya Technology Corp (南亞科技), the nation’s biggest computer memory chip maker, yesterday reported that sales last month surged as prices rose unexpectedly on the back of recovering demand after last year’s downturn.
The Taoyuan-based chipmaker said last month’s sales more than doubled to NT$5.26 billion (US$166 million), compared with NT$2.22 billion a year ago, it said in a company statement.
On a monthly basis, that represented 27 percent growth.
Shipments rose 17 percent last month from February, it said.
Nanya attributed the growth to resilient demand, which caused a supply constraint, it said.
The company originally thought prices would be flat last month.
Nanya, which supplies DRAM chips to PC makers like Dell Inc, raised prices by 10 percent month-on-month last month, company spokesman Pai Pei-lin (白培霖) said by phone.
“We are in talks with customers now for further price hikes [this month],” Pai said. “Supply is still tight as customers are trying to build up inventory so they can cope with hot seasonal demand in the second half of the year.”
Global shipments of laptop computers are expected to grow more than 21 percent to 204.9 million units this year from 168.8 million units last year, International Data Corp forecast.
In the first three months of the year, Nanya made NT$14.12 billion in revenues, up 129 percent from a year ago.
Separately, Inotera Memories Inc (華亞科技), a DRAM joint venture between Nanya and US memory giant Micron Technology Inc, yesterday reported a 23 percent month-on-month increase in last month’s sales to NT$4.14 billion, marking the best monthly sales since December, during which it made NT$4.67 billion.
That represented growth of 129 percent from the NT$1.81 billion it made a year ago.
Inotera accumulated NT$11.52 billion in revenues in the first quarter, up 81 percent year-on-year but down about 10 percent from NT$12.75 billion in the final quarter of last year.
Shares of Nanya went up 2.43 percent to NT$31.6. The stock price of Inotera rose 0.39 percent to NT$25.8 and Powerchip Semiconductor Corp (力晶半導體) rallied 3.36 percent to close at NT$5.53.
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