Memory Market Headed for Rebound

After years of falling prices, memory makers can finally look ahead to revenue growth, according to market research firm iSuppli. The group is forecasting average selling prices to finally stabilize, which will be a boon to the battered memory market.

Hardware Central takes a look at the latest forecast, which looks ahead to a very profitable year for memory firms.

The global DRAM market will show excellent recovery in 2010, with revenue expected to rise 40 percent without any major coinciding increase in prices, according to market researcher iSuppli.

iSuppli first noticed a rebound in memory prices late in 2009, and it now sees that momentum continuing. iSuppli’s preliminary forecast projects that the global DRAM market will rise to $31.9 billion in 2010, up 40.4 percent from $22.7 billion in 2009. That growth would reverse declines of 3.7 percent in 2009, 25.1 percent in 2008 and 7.5 percent in 2007.

Those sales figures are slightly deceptive, however. DRAM volume sales accelerated each of those years. There were times when the whole DRAM market would get bought up for a massive product launch, as Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) has done a few times. The problem was that average selling prices (ASPs) were dropping even faster than memory sales increased.

For 2010, iSuppli projects DRAM ASPs will be flat with 2009, which is actually progress, according to iSuppli senior analyst Mike Howard.

“For 2010, the weighted average ASP versus 2009 will be fairly flat compared to 2009,” Howard told InternetNews.com. “For an industry used to 50 percent year-on-year declines in ASPs, a flat year is like an up year.”

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Stability Leads to Memory Market Growth