SDRAM pricing seems to have stabilised after months of free fall, with the benchmark 8 x 8 PC100 64Mb SDRAM staying at $3.85 ($4.08 per unit) in the US, while the value of 8 x 8 PC133 64Mb SDRAMs remained at $3.90 (4.13 per chip).

PC133 128 megabit SDRAMs were at $8.53 (unit price $9.04), and PC100 128-megabit SDRAMs remained unchanged at the $8.42 ($8.93) range.

Steve Appleton, Chairman of Micron Technology, says prices will continue to stay low into Q1 next year, because OEMs had expected a memory shortage in Q4 and stocked up on DRAM chips. Now many companies have a huge oversupply which has eased demand, pushing prices down.

Micron still claims to be able to make a profit on $4 64 Mbit memory chips but claims that Japanese and Taiwanese memory producers cannot make a profit at this price. ®