"Spring of Memory Comes"... SK Hynix Regains 2nd Place in Global DRAM Market in Q2 (Comprehensive)

SK Hynix Surpasses US Micron
Q2 DRAM Sales Increase by 20%
Performance Improvement Expected Sooner with HBM Leadership

DRAM sales, which had been declining since the third quarter of last year, successfully rebounded in the second quarter of this year. This supports the view that the memory semiconductor market has bottomed out. In particular, SK Hynix is expected to accelerate its performance improvement period by showing remarkable results in the high-performance product market such as Double Data Rate (DDR)5 and High Bandwidth Memory (HBM).

Taiwanese market research firm TrendForce announced on the 25th that global DRAM sales in the second quarter of this year reached approximately $11.428 billion, a 20.4% increase from the previous quarter.

The DRAM market experienced a continuous decline from the third quarter of last year through the first quarter of this year due to macroeconomic and IT market sluggishness. In the second quarter of this year, shipments from major manufacturers increased, leading to a rebound.

The headquarters of SK Hynix in Icheon City.
Photo by Yonhap News

TrendForce explained, "The increase in demand for artificial intelligence (AI) servers drove the growth in HBM shipments," adding, "All three major DRAM suppliers saw an increase in shipments."

Among the companies, SK Hynix's progress was the most remarkable. SK Hynix recorded sales of $3.44 billion in the second quarter, marking a 48.9% growth compared to the previous quarter. Its market share also expanded from 24.4% in the first quarter to 30.1% in the second quarter, reclaiming the second-place position in the market previously held by Micron.

TrendForce stated, "SK Hynix's sales increased by nearly 50% quarter-over-quarter due to a significant rise in shipments of high-value-added products such as DDR5 and HBM," and added, "This led the overall DRAM market's sales recovery."

SK Hynix, which holds the number one market share in the HBM market, is expected to achieve meaningful performance improvements in the second half of the year. Currently, the global HBM market is dominated by Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix. TrendForce reported that SK Hynix held about 50% of the global HBM market share last year, ranking first, while Samsung Electronics ranked second with 40%.

SK Hynix 'HBM3E'.
Photo by SK Hynix
Image source: Yonhap News

Notably, SK Hynix is the only company mass-producing the 4th generation HBM product, HBM3. SK Hynix is the sole producer mass-producing the 4th generation product HBM3, following the 1st generation (HBM), 2nd generation (HBM2), and 3rd generation (HBM2E). On the 22nd, it also announced that it developed the 5th generation HBM3E and began supplying samples to customers such as Nvidia. TrendForce estimates that the HBM market share of Korean companies will expand from the current 90% to 95% this year.

At a recent private investor relations (IR) session held for major institutional investors and securities analysts, SK Hynix mentioned that it plans to more than double its HBM volume next year compared to this year. The company is determined to "row when the tide comes in" to end the long winter of the memory semiconductor market.

Han Dong-hee, a researcher at SK Securities, said, "The direction of improvement in the semiconductor market has become clear," and added, "With the start of inventory decline reducing valuation losses and strong AI demand, the DRAM industry will sequentially begin to turn around from the third quarter depending on the strength of the benefits."

Meanwhile, Samsung Electronics' DRAM sales in the second quarter reached $4.53 billion, an 8.3% increase from the previous quarter. However, its market share decreased from 43.9% in the first quarter to 39.6% in the second quarter. Micron also posted sales of $2.95 billion, a 15.7% increase from the previous quarter, but its market share slightly declined.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.