Big news out of FMS last week, Objective Analysis’ Jim Hand spoke about with The Register, confirming that we are in a Flash oversupply which is why pricing has dropped at such a steady rate, but according to Handy, it will get even better in 2019.
NAND Flash Prices Could Get Even Lower in 2019
Apparently, there will be a downward pricing correction to the point of possible collapse, near production cost of 64-layer 3D NAND, meaning 8 cents per GB is a strong possibility heading into 2019. Handy said it would be the largest price correction ever in the history of semiconductors.
Related SK Hynix Introduces Their Newest Tech 4D NAND At FMS
Of course, statements like that will probably only make consumers assume they should wait till prices get as low as possible, though drives are currently available for around 15-20 cents/GB which after you factor the costs of controllers, logistics, and other factors, would come slightly cheaper, the number they are giving you is the cost of the NAND itself, not the actual branded product. So those jumping for joy at the idea of sub $40 500GB drives should keep this in mind.
Another thing pointed out in the article is that approximately 70% of industry flash is 3D NAND, with the rest being older 2D or planar NAND, Handy said this could be migrated to DRAM instead, which hopefully would result in lower prices to the absolutely horrid state of DRAM pricing. He warns that it could result in a similar problem for DRAM if they over correct.
Deep StorageNet’s Chief scientist Howard Marks spoke at the summit as well and suggested that a 5x differentiation in dollars per gigabyte is the crossover point to move toward SSD cannibalization, or breaking point before almost total SSD domination.
Related Toshiba Announces New Flash Memory Technology XL-Flash Low-Latency 3D NAND
This could be made even worse or better depending on how you look at it, with Micron and Intel aiming at QLC along with brands like Toshiba for read-intensive applications. Though many in the comments will be saying that “this is the end of spinning rust” that has been said many times over the past 8 years or so, and I’ll remain on the fence with that argument until I actually see it. QLC is not the be all end all for consumers since it’s write capacity and endurance leaves a lot to be desired.
Source: The Register
