Stronger memory market boosts Micron

[Julio Franco]

Shares of Micron Technology rose Wednesday after the company announced a surprise first-quarter profit on strong demand for memory chips.

The Boise, Idaho-based company had net income of $1 million for the first quarter of its fiscal 2004, which ended Dec. 4, on sales of $1.1 billion. That compares to a $316 million net loss on sales of $685 million in the same period a year earlier.

Read more: CNet News.

 

[Masque]

Watch the prices start to climb. I'm starting to see this at the raw material end already. Get your memory and any chip-related electronics now.....

 

[poertner_1274]

Do you really think they will raise prices? I mean that is one way to drive the customers away from the market. I think the reason they are making so much money right now is because the chips are at very reasonable prices. If they raise them again, I have a feeling that not as many people would go out and buy them because it isn't really 'worth' it.

 

[tripleione]

Let's hope that they do not start to produce crappier products because of their increase in sales. I can think of at least two companies who have done this recently... :suspiciou

 

[Masque]

Originally posted by poertner_1274
Do you really think they will raise prices? I mean that is one way to drive the customers away from the market. I think the reason they are making so much money right now is because the chips are at very reasonable prices. If they raise them again, I have a feeling that not as many people would go out and buy them because it isn't really 'worth' it.

Yes, the prices will go up....it's supply and demand. They're not making that much money right now....the volume is up but the prices are down. And people will buy them if they're 'slightly' more.....it's a matter of wanting them badly enough and whether or not it's "worth it" in their own mind.

 

[khosw]

the ddr ram is still pretty expensive, specifically the pc3200 256MB. I was expecting ~$32 from crucial. it's at $45 now.

 

[StormBringer]

Originally posted by tripleione
Let's hope that they do not start to produce crappier products because of their increase in sales.

I don't really see that happening. At least not to the Crucial division, they have one of the most respected names in RAM and didn't come by that name by selling shoddy product.

 

[tripleione]

Take a look at nVIDIA, though. They, too, had one of the most respected names in the graphics card industry. Look what has happened now... shoddy DX9 support, cheating drivers and lackluster performance from their video cards have plagued their company for a while now.

Money corrupts...

 

[Masque]

Originally posted by tripleione
Take a look at nVIDIA, though. They, too, had one of the most respected names in the graphics card industry. Look what has happened now... shoddy DX9 support, cheating drivers and lackluster performance from their video cards have plagued their company for a while now.

Money corrupts...

nVidia's been scrambling to regain market share though.....the competition from ATI's been rough on 'em. Crucial has a history of quality memory right from the get-go and I don't see them changing. They aren't out to get the entire memory market, but they are fairly elite in their standings.

 

[UncleGemboel]

Agree. Crucial has build a strong market as one of the best memory avaible for customer. They always keep their product at top quality and i don't thinks they will make a bad product. And for nvidia, they fight for gain a better market share and too bad they failed to supply a good quality.

 

[tripleione]

Originally posted by UncleGemboel
Agree. Crucial has build a strong market as one of the best memory avaible for customer. They always keep their product at top quality and i don't thinks they will make a bad product. And for nvidia, they fight for gain a better market share and too bad they failed to supply a good quality.

Well, to be fair, I didn't say it would happen to them, just that there is always a possibility. However, the memory and graphics industy are two completely different fields of business, so it makes sense that Crucial would have a harder time to fall into something like what nVIDIA has.

 

[MrGaribaldi]

Dang, this could mean higher prices for the next gen graphics cards....

Hopefully it'll only be a small increase in consumer prices, and doesn't affect DDR2/GDDR3...

On the other hand, it's nice to see that memory makers are turning a profit...

 

[chuonthis]

I wonder how much of Crucial's business was helped along by Microsoft. With people upgrading to Windows XP, the demand for more memory has probably risen. Although Microsoft recommends 128MB, it seems that 256MB is a minimum and 512MB is recommended.

 

[poertner_1274]

I totally agree with this chuonthis, if someone gets a system with that minimal memory sec, I wouldn't want to use their computer. Maybe they secretly partnered !?!?! :haha:

But it is still something interesting to think about.

 

[Masque]

One thing to keep in mind with all of this though is that with a lot of chip manufacturing, the chips are getting smaller and are being produced in conjuntion with other materials, hence the total amount of specific raw materials (polysilicon and such) is being reduced. This could also have some impact on pricing in the future.

 

[agissi]

Well Micron make ram, so if more is selling no crap Micron is going to get wealthier..

One thing to keep in mind with all of this though is that with a lot of chip manufacturing, the chips are getting smaller and are being produced in conjuntion with other materials, hence the total amount of specific raw materials (polysilicon and such) is being reduced. This could also have some impact on pricing in the future.

Thats a really good point never thought about that. But when are we going to get solid state, another 10 years to come you recon?

and MrGaribaldi, why would this lead to higher prices in next.gen graphics cards?

 

[StormBringer]

Originally posted by ---agissi---
But when are we going to get solid state, another 10 years to come you recon?

Solid-State what? RAM is already solid-state, as are most other electronic devices that we use today(with a few exceptions). One of the few areas that is not yet solid state is hard disk drives.

 

[Masque]

Originally posted by StormBringer
Solid-State what? RAM is already solid-state, as are most other electronic devices that we use today(with a few exceptions). One of the few areas that is not yet solid state is hard disk drives.

One thing I think you'll see in the fairly near future (within 5 years) is a solid-state OS. Imagine Windows (or their counterpart) booting up within 3 seconds of the machine turning on? The monitor wouldn't even have warmed up by then. I think this is a real possibility given the advancements in the field.

 

[MrGaribaldi]

Originally posted by ---agissi---
and MrGaribaldi, why would this lead to higher prices in next.gen graphics cards?

Considering that most of the costs when manufacturing a video card comes from the memory modules, it wouldn't be too strange to see them going up in price if the memory went up in price...


There are limits to how small margins a company will allow themselves to have...