Kingston Technology has booked up almost all of the available DDR3 production capacity at Nanya Technology, and the majority of that at Powerchip Technology, according to industry sources.
Nanya and Powerchip are among the DRAM manufacturers looking to diversify their product lines away from PC-use parts and into other areas such as specialty DRAM, niche-market memory and foundry services.
Acknowledging that the global supply of PC DRAM chips will be tight, Kingston has reached a deal with Nanya to secure the available DDR3 capacity, and also the chips stockpiled previously by the chipmaker, the sources said. Nanya has about 100 million DDR3 chips on hand at present, the sources disclosed.
Nanya said previously that the company would allocate more capacity to produce higher-ASP memory products targeted at servers and mobile devices, such as tablets.
Kingston and Nanya have both declined to comment on the report.
In addition, Kingston has secured the available PC-use DDR3 capacity at Powerchip - estimated at about 20,000 12-inch wafer starts monthly, the sources indicated.
Powerchip has shifted its business focus to foundry services for non-memory ICs, but reportedly still kept a portion of equipment for the manufacture of PC DRAM chips.