Posted on Wednesday, December 24 2008 @ 17:05 CET by Thomas De Maesschalck
Memory maker Micron is hit hard by the steep decline of memory chip prices due to global oversupply, the firm posted a eight-straight loss of $706 million on net sales of $1.4 billion in its fiscal Q1 2009.
In the quarter ended December 4, 2008, the Boise, Idaho company posted a net loss of $706 million or 91 cents per diluted share, on net sales of $1.4 billion, down 8.7 percent. Analysts surveyed by Bloomberg had forecast a loss of 45 cents a share.
The 2009 fiscal first quarter results include a $369 million write-down of memory chip products, Micron said.
The largest U.S. manufacturer of memory chips said it saw steep drops in the average selling prices for its DRAM and NAND Flash memory products, which dove 34 percent and 24 percent respectively. DRAM is used as the main memory in PCs. Flash is used for storage in digital cameras, digital music players, and solid-state drives.
As a result, sales of memory products fell 4 percent from the previous quarter due to "significant decreases in market selling prices for the company's products," Micron said. Sales, however, measured in gigabits, increased 35 percent for DRAM and 40 percent for NAND flash memory.
Source: CNET
