| From: Elroy | 3/20/2019 10:59:55 PM | | | | | | Lets see what MU's conference call says about SIMO's business.
In SSDs, we are making progress on transitioning to NVMe while continuing to improve our cost profile in SATA. In fiscal Q2, we began revenue shipments to a large PC OEM for our first NVMe client SSD, which features our internally designed controller, and are in active qualifications with other customers. We intend to introduce cloud and enterprise NVMe SSDs later this calendar year. In SATA, we introduced consumer and client SSDs based on 96-layer 3D NAND in fiscal Q2. In the cloud market, our custom persistent memory solution, which combines DRAM and NAND, is now fully ramped and contributed meaningfully to our cloud revenues.
That launch of internal MU NVME controllers is bad....
Now turning to end markets. I’ll start with mobile. During fiscal Q2 we grew revenues and expanded gross margins year-over-year despite adverse memory and storage pricing and weakness in high-end smartphone unit sales. Our performance in mobile was propelled by growth in our managed NAND portfolio, where NAND bit shipments grew more than 5x year-over-year.
I wonder if this means UFS with SIMO's controllers? What is their "managed NAND" portfolio??
NAND markets remain oversupplied from the acceleration in bit growth driven by the industry transition to 64-layer 3D NAND. Although fiscal Q2 pricing came in below our expectations, we are optimistic that demand elasticity and seasonal trends will support improving demand growth in the second half of the calendar year.
We have been managing our NAND bit supply growth prudently, including adjusting our capital planning and wafer volumes. We are reducing our total NAND wafer starts by approximately 5%, mostly through reductions on our legacy nodes.
Given these changes in DRAM and NAND industry conditions, we have reduced our CapEx for fiscal 2019 and are evaluating our CapEx for fiscal 2020. We are taking prudent actions to address the current market conditions, while executing well on our long-term strategic objectives.
NAND revenue declined 2% year-over-year and 18% from the prior quarter. NAND revenue represented 30% of total Company revenue in the fiscal Q2. Our overall NAND ASP declined in the mid-20% range, while shipment quantities increased in the upper single-digit percent range compared to the prior quarter. NAND bit shipments came in stronger than our expectation due to timing of demand from a large customer.
Inventory ended the quarter at $4.4 billion, increasing from $3.9 billion at the end of the fiscal first quarter. Our fiscal second quarter days of inventory were 134 days compared to 107 days in the fiscal first quarter. The actions that we have announced today regarding supply reductions, combined with improving customer demand, will begin to address our higher inventory levels.
Now, turning to our market outlook. DRAM and NAND markets are working through supply and demand imbalances. Our visibility remains low and the near-term environment remains challenging. While there have been CapEx reductions across the industry, they haven’t yet impacted output growth due to lead times.
Q; So, do you anticipate inventories actually moving higher here in the May quarter, before it starts to down shift in the back half of the calendar year?
A: Yes. I think, inventory might be a little bit elevated in the May quarter relative to where we are today. I think, we’ll be in pretty good shape on DRAM, as I said, as we kind of exit the calendar year. NAND will take a little bit longer because of the reasons we cited about keeping elevated levels of inventory into 2020.
as well as growing our mobile opportunities on the NAND side where we have gained meaningful share over the course of last few quarters.
and that was related to NAND. And with respect to the second part of your question, as I said before, that we do see evidence of inventory consumption by our customers and that gives us confidence that this inventory will largely work itself through the system in the first half with improvements in demand in the second half. |
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| From: Elroy | 3/21/2019 5:01:13 AM | | | | | | Falling NAND flash prices to drive SSD adoption in enterprise, datacenter apps
https://www.digitimes.com/news/a20190320PD210.html |
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| From: Elroy | 3/21/2019 10:05:09 AM | | | | | | | PCIe SSD rising as mainstream, to grab 50% market share in 2019 | | Driven by sharp price falls for NAND flash chips, global shipments of SSDs are estimated to surge 20-25% in 2019 from 200 million units seen in 2018, and PCIe SSDs are expected to emerge as a new mainstream offering by the end of 2019 with a market share of 50% on a par with SATA SSDs, according to industry sources.
The sources said that SSDs are now available with minimum capacity of 256GB following significant improvements in 3D NAND flash process and yield rates, and 480GB SSDs are rising as a consumer market mainstream in 2019.
Apacer Technology president CK Chang said that with better performance, consumer PCIe SSDs will gradually replace SATA SSDs. He continued that PCIe SSDs will soon also be mass adopted for data storage at industrial control systems and datacenters.
Market sources said that unit price for 512GB PCIe SSD has fallen by11% sequentially to US$55 in the first quarter of 2019, compared to a corresponding price drop of 9% for SATA SSD, with price gap between the two types of SSD continuing to narrow from 30% seen in 2018.
The sources continued that current average unit price for 512GB SSDs has declined to the same level for 256 GB SSDs registered one year earlier, and larger price falls for SSDs ranging in capacity from 512GB to 1TB are expected in the remainder of 2019.
Falling average selling prices for consumer Gen 3.0x2 PCIe SSDs fitted in notebooks will accelerate the adoption of such SSDs by OEMs. This, coupled with demand for ever-higher storage capacity and speed to support cloud computing, 5G and autonomous driving applications, will further stimulate market demand for PCIe SSDs and inspire brand vendors to gear up production of such lucrative storage devices and related chips, the sources indicated.
For instance, Taiwan-based IC designers Silicon Motion Technology, Phison Electronics, and Silicon Integrated Systems are racing to roll out enhanced version of PCI SSD controller chips, while major brand vendors such as Kingston Technology, Adata Technology, Transcend Information, Seagate and Micron have also listed PCIe SSDs as their mainstream product lines.
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| To: franklin1 who wrote (2028) | 3/21/2019 6:34:55 PM | | From: Elroy | | | | MU announced an internal controller for their latest NVME SSD models. That's bad, it means MU may go internal going forward. More likely they will use SIMO controllers for some models and internal controllers for others, and it will then depend on how each model does in the market.
But pretty bad news all around. I get the impression SIMO should do great in the next round of client SSD growth, and then after that it will have more competition from internal controllers from the NAND makers. Offsetting the MU and WDC trend to go internal is MRVL's decision to exit client SSD controllers completely. I get the impression that SIMO kicked MRVL's butt in client SSD controllers, so they exited the market, now we've gotta see how the internal teams do against SIMO. While a controller may not be that super difficult to make, I think SIMO's appeal is that they have the controllers ready for usage BEFORE the supply chain is ready to make design wins, so with SIMO you get a functional controller (hopefully a great one, but who knows) on time, while with the NAND makers internal teams it may he harder to meet deadline and such. SIMO has millions of R&D dollars to throw at making controllers, the internal teams must be limited on how much they can spend and still be more cost effective than just buying from SIMO.
It's all market share. SIMO can amortize one controller across 20 customers, the internal teams have to amortize their internal program against one product line. If that line just does so so, the internal team could be on the chopping block in the next downturn. |
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| From: Elroy | 3/25/2019 5:30:47 AM | | | | | |
Memory module firm Team Group looks to revenue and profit growth in 2019
Siu Han, Taipei; Jessie Shen, DIGITIMES
Monday 25 March 2019
digitimes.com
Taiwan-based memory module maker Team Group will be aggressively expanding sales of its high-margin gaming and industrial products to enhance further its profitability in 2019, according to company chairman Danny Hsia.
Hsia also expressed optimism about Team Group's SSD shipments this year, driven by memory chip prices that have been falling since 2018. The company enjoyed robust SSD shipment growth in the first two months of 2019, when revenues increased 11.7% from a year earlier.
Team Group's overall shipments this year are expected to be 30-40% higher than 2018 levels, said Hsia, adding that revenues will grow around 10% on year. Falling chip prices have affected the company's product ASPs but driven shipment growth, Hsia continued.
Nevertheless, DRAM and NAND flash prices are likely to stop falling in the third quarter of 2019, Hsia commented. Team Group expects revenues this year to hit another record high of nearly NT$8 billion (US$259.5 million), with an on-year increase in profits.
Team Group posted revenues of NT$7.2 billion in 2018, up 5.5% on year and hitting a record high. EPS for the year came to NT$3.04.
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| From: Elroy | 3/26/2019 5:47:28 AM | | | | | | Samsung Warns on Q1 Profit As Weak Memory, Smartphone Demand Weighs on Chipmaker
thestreet.com
Samsung Electronics warned that its first quarter profits, already hit by slowing semiconductor sales and limp smartphone demand, would likely miss estimates as the world's biggest chipmaker provided a rare pre-earnings update to market regulators Tuesday. |
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| From: Elroy | 4/9/2019 8:45:06 AM | | | | | | Silicon Motion Announces Preliminary First Quarter 2019 Revenue and Earnings Conference Call Details
TAIPEI, Taiwan and MILPITAS, Calif., April 09, 2019 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Silicon Motion Technology Corporation (NasdaqGS: SIMO)(“Silicon Motion” or the “Company”), a global leader in NAND flash controllers for solid state storage devices, announces that based on its preliminary first quarter financial results, revenue is expected to be within 5% below the low-end of the original guidance range of $97.5 million to $103.6 million that the company issued on January 30, 2019. Gross margin (non-GAAP) is expected to be within 50 basis points above the high-end of the company's original guidance range of 47.0% to 50.0%.
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Stinks! But we knew this quarter stunk. Future is the key.
Strange to have weak sales and above average gross margins. Perhaps controller sales were strong, but eMMC was weak as they were supposed to be dumping old low gross margin eMMC in the Q.
With those results, I think we get
$94m sales
$47.5m gross margins
$33.5m operating expense
$14m operating profit
$12m net profit
34m shares out,
So.......~34 cents EPS? Not too good...... |
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| From: Elroy | 4/18/2019 12:48:35 AM | | | | | | The China Flash Market web page tracks memory prices. After being stable for a good while, the prices of SSDs are (finally) collapsing.
A 256GB TLC SSD has gone from $35 in the beginning of the year to $28 today. That type of price decline should drive adoption across the board.... |
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| From: Elroy | 4/19/2019 11:54:21 PM | | | | | |
NAND flash price falls to slow
Siu Han, Taipei; Jessie Shen, DIGITIMES
Friday 19 April 2019
digitimes.com
NAND flash prices are expected to fall less than 10% sequentially in the second quarter of 2019, and will likely stop falling later this year, according to industry sources.
Having fallen since 2018, NAND flash prices dropped further in the first quarter of 2019, said the sources. Samsung Electronics started cutting its NAND flash quotes in the first quarter aiming to clear out inventory, sending other NAND flash chipmakers following suit, the sources indicated.
Samsung is likely to continue its low-price strategy, but at a moderate pace, in the second quarter, the sources noted. Meanwhile, other NAND flash chipmakers intend to not follow suit this time given that prices are approaching their cash costs, the sources said.
NAND flash chipmakers have seen their inventory levels pile up since the second half of 2018, due mainly to a slowdown in demand for datacenter applications. Inventory build-ups already prompted Samsung to take the lead in cutting prices, the sources suggested.
Meanwhile, falling NAND flash prices are driving greater SSD adoption in PCs and other client devices, while the memory content per box for smartphones and other end devices continues to increase. End-market demand is expected to rise starting from the third quarter, bringing stability to NAND flash prices, the sources said.
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