Korean chipmakers Samsung Electronics Co. and SK Hynix were able to bump up share in the flash memory market in the second quarter despite overall stagnation in the chip market powering mobile devices.

According to a posting by DRAMeXchange on Friday, Samsung Electronics earned $3.8 billion in shipments in NAND flash in the quarter ended June to command 34.9 percent of the global market, improving from 29.9 percent in the previous quarter.

Its sales in flash memory added 16.6 percent, although combined global revenue stayed stagnant at $10.8 billion.

Samsung’s bit (volume) shipment in the second quarter expanded 30 percent from the previous quarter, thanks to recovery in server demand and increase in adoption of high capacity products in various applications, said DRAMeXchange. As demand picked up, the quarter-on-quarter fall in average selling price also softened to 15 percent.

Another Korean chipmaker SK Hynix Inc. saw its second-quarter revenue from NAND flash business gain 8.1 percent on quarter to 1.1 billion dollars. Its shipment jumped 40 percent over the same period, helping to offset the 25 percent drop in average selling price. Its market share rose to 10.3 percent from 9.5 percent at the end of March to come at No. 5.

[Source: DRAMeXchange, a division of TrendForce]

The two Korean names made up a combined 45.2 percent of the flash memory market.

Toshiba, world’s second largest NAND flash maker that suffered supply trouble due to outrage at Yokkaichi plant in June, registered $1.9 billion in revenue for the second quarter, shrinking 10.6 percent from the first quarter. American names Western Digital Corp (WDC) and Micron posted quarter-on-quarter falls of 6.5 percent and 17.7 percent, respectively.

Toshiba represented 18.1 percent of global market, WDC 14.0 percent, and Micron 13.5 percent.

The overall NAND flash shipment of world’s major chipmakers grew 15 percent in the second quarter on improved demand in notebook PC and server markets from the first quarter but their total revenue stayed unchanged at $10.8 billion from the previous quarter due to soft prices, said DRAMeXchange in a report.

"Although peak season demand is expected to push up shipments in the third quarter looking forward, demand will probably be weaker than previous years due to the geo-economical conflicts," it said.

By Hwang Soon-min and Cho Jeehyun

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