Today, Taiwanese media Digitimes reported that Western Digital has notified customers of NAND flash memory price increases. Flash memory prices may rise by as much as 55% in the next few quarters. Western Digital's mechanical hard drives will set new prices on a weekly basis. In terms of NAND flash memory price increases, it is mainly due to the recovery of the consumer electronics market and industry production cuts, which has led to an increase in NAND demand and a decrease in supply, so prices have begun to rebound.
At present, the price of NAND flash memory is indeed rising steadily, and the prices of corresponding end products such as memory chips used in smartphones and consumer solid-state drives are also increasing.
One reason for the price increase in mechanical hard drives is that Lissennoco Taiwan, a subsidiary of Japan's Showa Denko, is about to close its factory. Lissennoco Taiwan's factory mainly produces films for mechanical hard drives and is one of the major suppliers.
However, Lisenko's Taiwan factory claims that it is no longer competitive to continue to produce such products in Taiwan, so it plans to close the factory. The 600 employees in the factory will be laid off in the future, which will lead to an increase in the price of mechanical hard drives due to raw material supply problems.
Western Digital informed customers that the company is adjusting production capacity in response to the market supply environment. It will be difficult to respond immediately to unplanned demands and orders, that is, to put into production and supply. Therefore, customers are reminded to check their order status and contact Western Digital as soon as possible if necessary.