Hyundai Electronics Industries (HEI) looks set to become the number one supplier of DRAM memory chips for 1999, beating out longtime leader Samsung Corp, according to projections from research firm International Data Corp (IDC). IDC claims that Hyundai, through its acquisition of LG Semicon, has now grabbed 23.5% of the market. And American manufacturer Micron Technology has now slid into second place with 17.6%. Samsung has a 16.8% share.
The sheer size of the merged Hyundai-LG operation is one reason why it has pushed Samsung off the top. However, the proliferation of different DRAM technologies being produced this year, including Rambus and PC133 Synchronous DRAM (SDRAM), may have contributed to Samsung’s reversal in fortune. The firm got heavily behind the Intel-supported Rambus technology, which has not taken off in the way many companies expected yet. HEI chose instead to concentrate its efforts on SDRAM and double data rate SDRAM (DDR-SDRAM), technologies which gathered a lot of support in the industry. á
