Innovation and New Product Development Case Study

Samsung: Betting on Memory Chip

OR

Abstract:
FThis structured assignment is to accompany the case '307-216-1'. The abstract of the case is as follows: Samsung Electronics, the largest memory chip maker, was growing steadily with its memory chip business due to the onset of the digital era. High quality audio and video entertainment gadgets entailed huge amounts of data storage and required a high capacity storage space to store this huge amount of data. This benefited Samsung as its NAND flash chips had been used to store the data and dynamic random access memory (DRAM) to process them quickly into sound and moving pictures. In the semiconductor industry, Samsung was well placed as it controlled nearly a third of the world's DRAM market and about half of the NAND market. Moreover, analysts expected that the DRAM sale would rise 14% and NAND by 29% in 2006. But the global memory chip industry had always been known for its volatile business cycle so it might be difficult on the part of Samsung to keep its steady growth in this cyclical market. The case deals with the global semiconductor market and how Samsung had been betting high on this volatile industry with its memory chip business.

Pedagogical Objectives:

Keywords :  Samsung, Memory chip, Semiconductor, DRAM (dynamic random access memory), NAND (Not And) flash, Hynix, Qimonda, Toshiba, AMD, Intel, Texas Instruments, Vista, Nokia, Motorola, Microsoft