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Micron dangles predictable memory price agreements in front of vendors

The idea? To get investors muttering: DRAM, those gross margins are stable...

Dan Robinson Fri 13 May 2022 // 15:00 UTC

Memory and storage maker Micron Technology has revealed a new business model intended to address the volatility in the memory market that has resulted in sharp swings in pricing over the past several years.
Revealed at Micron's Investor Day 2022 event, the new forward pricing agreements enable a Micron customer to sign a multi-year deal that guarantees them a supply of memory at a predictable price that follows the cost reduction that the chipmaker sees during the lifecycle of a particular product.
Micron's chief business officer Sumit Sadana told Investor Day attendees that the chipmaker has already signed up an unnamed volume customer to one of the new agreements, which the company is currently trying out to see whether it delivers on the expected benefits.

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This may seem weird but don't give us all the chip funding, say Intel and friends

Semiconductor Alliance wants US R&D billions to be dished out fairly, broadly, objectively

Dylan Martin Thu 7 Apr 2022 // 11:29 UTC

A newly formed group is calling for the US to ensure efforts and public funding to boost the nation's domestic semiconductor industry benefits a broad family of stakeholders, not just a few companies.
The Semiconductor Alliance, which took form mid-2021, just got the backing of three major American chipmakers, including Intel – the processor giant that has put itself front and center in urging Congress to pass $52 billion in chip funding. The second latest big supporter, Micron Technology, has also made some noise about the subsidies while we haven't seen as much from the group's third major supporter, Analog Devices.
The question is: does Intel really want to lift all boats, so to speak? Bear in mind that the x86 giant, as part of its comeback plan, is trying to revitalize its foundry business. The success of that effort relies on a variety of companies, big and small, entrusting Intel to manufacture their chips. To get to that point, those companies may well need a helping hand.

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Epyc move: Micron shifts high-demand chip design apps to AMD

Memory and storage maker skips over Intel this time

Dylan Martin Mon 21 Mar 2022 // 17:30 UTC

Micron Technology is now using AMD's newly announced third-generation Epyc server CPUs to power most of its high-demand applications for designing memory and storage chips.
Ram Peddibhotla, AMD's corporate vice president of Epyc product management, told The Register last week about Micron's decision, and a spokesperson for Micron later confirmed to us that it moved "most of its most demanding" electronic design automation applications to servers with AMD's CPUs last year.
"They have a state-of-the-art, high performance architecture for EDA to get them to design their products [and] maximize productivity for their designers," he said.

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Micron expects COVID-19-hit Xi'an DRAM factory to reopen as normal soon

Neither cough nor sneeze nor gloom of coronavirus stays these chip makers from their appointed rounds

Agam Shah Fri 7 Jan 2022 // 00:31 UTC

Micron expects to resume normal operations at its Chinese DRAM facility in Xi'an later this month despite it being under lock down following a COVID-19 outbreak about two weeks ago.
"We do expect to get back to normal sometime later this month," said David Zinsner, chief financial officer at Micron, during a webcast for the JP Morgan Auto/Tech conference this week.
Micron assembles and tests DRAM at the Xi'an facility. The biz last week said it reduced the headcount and operations at the facility after Xi'an was locked down in December. Samsung, which also has manufacturing facilities in Xi'an, on the same day announced it too had scaled down operations.

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Who's Intel Inside and Outside today: PC chip boss installed after EVP heads for exit – plus next CFO named

25-year veteran Michelle Johnston Holthaus appointed alongside beancounter from Micron

Agam Shah Tue 11 Jan 2022 // 00:06 UTC

Intel today announced a new showrunner for its PC processor business and named its next chief financial officer, who is arriving from Micron.
Gregory Bryant, who as an executive vice-president ran Intel's Client Computing Group, is leaving at the end of this month to pursue "a new opportunity," the chip giant said.
Bryant, who just oversaw Chipzilla's CES launches, will be replaced by Michelle Johnston Holthaus. Her title will be executive vice president and general manager of the client division, which focuses on components for personal computers and other consumer electronics.

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Memory maker Micron offers hope for PC parts supply returning 'in the coming months'

Oh, and boasts over record-breaking return from IoT segment, too

Gareth Halfacree Wed 29 Sep 2021 // 16:15 UTC

Memory maker Micron has some words of encouragement for those who are still struggling to find the parts they need for a PC build at less than usurious pricing: Supply shortages are likely to be "largely resolved" over the next few months.
That there's an ongoing component shortage in the electronics industry isn't news, particularly to PC gamers. Nvidia's popular GPUs became hard to find back in 2018 with chief exec Jensen Huang blaming demand from cryptocurrency miners. The pandemic only made things worse, and it's still difficult to find ready supplies of both AMD and Nvidia graphics cards at their recommended retail prices - thanks to scalpers buying up what supply there is and flipping them for a quick profit.
There's light at the end of the tunnel, Micron president and chief exec Sanjay Mehrotra told investors and analysts during the company's earnings call for its Q4 of fiscal 2021, ended September 2. "Some PC customers are adjusting their memory and storage purchases due to shortages of non-memory components that are needed to complete PC builds," he explained, seemingly in reference to the scarcity of graphics cards and ICs.

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Memory maker Micron moots $150bn mega manufacturing moneybag

AI and 5G to fuel demand for new plants and R&D

Lindsay Clark Wed 20 Oct 2021 // 19:55 UTC

Chip giant Micron has announced a $150bn global investment plan designed to support manufacturing and research over the next decade.
The memory maker said it would include expansion of its fabrication facilities to help meet demand.
As well as chip shortages due to COVID-19 disruption, the $21bn-revenue company said it wanted to take advantage of the fact memory and storage accounts for around 30 per cent of the global semiconductor industry today.

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Micron: We're pulling the plug on 3D XPoint. Anyone in the market for a Utah chip factory?

Intel's Gelsinger has a decision to make

Chris Mellor Wed 17 Mar 2021 // 11:45 UTC

Micron is stopping development of 3D XPoint technology and shifting resources into memory products that use the Compute Express Link (CXL).
3D XPoint is the storage-class memory used in Intel's Optane brand SSDs and Persistent Memory (DIMM) products. CXL is an industry standard interface that enables flexible interconnection between compute, memory and storage devices.
Micron president and CEO Sanjay Mehrotra said in a statement: "Memory and storage are critical to the data economy, and the need for data centre memory innovation has never been greater.

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Micron announces EUV fabs by 2024 as it flogs Utah facility to Texas Instruments

Oh, and it would like everyone to know it had a fantastic sales quarter, natch

Gareth Halfacree Thu 1 Jul 2021 // 12:15 UTC

Memory-maker Micron intends to implement extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography in its fabrication plants by 2024.
Designed to keep Moore's Law alive by allowing the fabrication of ever-smaller chip features, extreme ultraviolet lithography is still relatively unusual in the semiconductor industry - helped by the high cost of the required equipment. Samsung and Taiwan Semiconductor (TSMC) both have EUV fabs online, and they're going to be joined by Micron - but only starting in 2024.
"We had always said that we monitor EUV progress. We have actually engaged in EUV evaluation. We have had EUV tool in the past," said Sanjay Mehrotra, Micron president and chief executive, during the company's Q3 fiscal '21 earnings call.

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Cisco names Micron as supplier of SSDs that make Nexus and Firepower kit snooze

Drive looks to be an industrial model, so probably not a wider threat

Simon Sharwood, APAC Editor Wed 26 May 2021 // 05:58 UTC

Cisco has named Micron as the supplier of solid-state disks that put themselves to sleep after 28,224 hours of operation.
Switchzilla warned that flimsy firmware could fell some of its Nexus 9000 and 3000 devices back in February 2021, and last week issued Field Notices warning that some of its Firepower security appliances also had the problem.
The issue saw devices become unresponsive until restarted, but the problem recurred after a further 1,008 hours of operation.

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