Prices for DRAM chips used in servers are likely to drop at a faster pace of 18 percent next quarter as enterprise data center operators cut investments in servers amid the COVID-19 pandemic, TrendForce Corp (集邦科技) said yesterday.
Excessive inventory in barebone servers and DRAM chips for servers this quarter is also a key factor driving down prices, the Taipei-based researcher said in a report.
“Enterprise data operators have significantly revised down server purchases as the COVID-19 pandemic has created uncertainty for business outlook,” TrendForce said. “Most companies tend to suspend server orders.”
With enterprises expected to balk at new investments, server orders are expected to dip 10 percent this quarter from last quarter, while server shipments would fall 4.9 percent, TrendForce said.
Companies have changed investment strategies to support their regular operations rather than to expand fixed assets, it said.
A mild resumption of server purchases is expected among data center operators next quarter, which would bring a recovery to memory chips and related components at the end of this year or early next year, TrendForce said.
As the outlook remains bleak, the researcher lowered its price forecast for DRAM chips used in servers to a quarterly decline of 13 to 18 percent next quarter.
That compared with its earlier estimate of a quarterly decline of 10 to 15 percent.
Prices for 32-gigabyte server DRAM modules, a barometer for server DRAM price trends, would tumble by at least 15 percent next quarter, TrendForce said.
The decline might be more dramatic if demand continues to weaken, it said.
The latest forecast has factored in rush orders from Huawei Technologies Co (華為) over the past two weeks, after the Chinese company stocked as many memory chips and other components as it could before US export restrictions took effect on Tuesday, TrendForce said.
Huawei has ordered more server DRAM chips than normal from South Korean suppliers to avoid supply disruptions, the researcher said.
However, the extra orders from Huawei are not sufficient to ease the oversupply of DRAM chips, it said.
Supply of server DRAM chips has been backing up as they have a better profit margin than chips used in other electronics, it said.
As a result, DRAM inventories have exceeded the healthy level this quarter, it said.
Prices for server DRAM chips are expected to fall by 10 to 15 percent this quarter from the second quarter, unchanged from its earlier estimate, TrendForce said.
Taiwan Transport and Storage Corp (TTS, 台灣通運倉儲) yesterday unveiled its first electric tractor unit — manufactured by Volvo Trucks — in a ceremony in Taipei, and said the unit would soon be used to transport cement produced by Taiwan Cement Corp (TCC, 台灣水泥). Both TTS and TCC belong to TCC International Holdings Ltd (台泥國際集團). With the electric tractor unit, the Taipei-based cement firm would become the first in Taiwan to use electric vehicles to transport construction materials. TTS chairman Koo Kung-yi (辜公怡), Volvo Trucks vice president of sales and marketing Johan Selven, TCC president Roman Cheng (程耀輝) and Taikoo Motors Group
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
New apartments in Taiwan’s major cities are getting smaller, while old apartments are increasingly occupied by older people, many of whom live alone, government data showed. The phenomenon has to do with sharpening unaffordable property prices and an aging population, property brokers said. Apartments with one bedroom that are two years old or older have gained a noticeable presence in the nation’s six special municipalities as well as Hsinchu county and city in the past five years, Evertrust Rehouse Co (永慶房產集團) found, citing data from the government’s real-price transaction platform. In Taipei, apartments with one bedroom accounted for 19 percent of deals last
RECORD-BREAKING: TSMC’s net profit last quarter beat market expectations by expanding 8.9% and it was the best first-quarter profit in the chipmaker’s history Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), which counts Nvidia Corp as a key customer, yesterday said that artificial intelligence (AI) server chip revenue is set to more than double this year from last year amid rising demand. The chipmaker expects the growth momentum to continue in the next five years with an annual compound growth rate of 50 percent, TSMC chief executive officer C.C. Wei (魏哲家) told investors yesterday. By 2028, AI chips’ contribution to revenue would climb to about 20 percent from a percentage in the low teens, Wei said. “Almost all the AI innovators are working with TSMC to address the