Enterprise SSD prices are poised to continue their downward trend in the first quarter after falling 25% in the fourth quarter of 2022, according to TrendForce.
Due to sagging demand and a widening decline in contract prices, revenue in the enterprise SSD market fell 27.4% sequentially to US$3.79 billion in the fourth quarter of last year, TrendForce indicated.
Server OEMs slowed the momentum of their product shipments in the second half of 2022, TrendForce said. Chinese server buyers were also concerned about future demand and focused on reducing inventory. As a result, orders for enterprise SSDs have been slow.
However, rapid slowdowns in notebook and smartphone shipments prompted NAND flash suppliers to boost enterprise SSD shipments in the second half of last year, TrendForce continued. Drops in enterprise SSD prices continue to widen.
Samsung Electronics remained the largest enterprise SSD supplier by revenue in the fourth quarter of 2022. Samsung's active bargaining and goal of increasing shipment volume increased the company's market share to 46.9% during the quarter, TrendForce said.
Enterprise SSD sales for SK Group (SK Hynix and Solidigm) totaled over US$720 million in the fourth quarter of 2022, TrendForce said. Due to a decline in Chinese demand throughout 2022 and a delay in the release of new products, SK Group's market share for enterprise SSDs dropped to 19.0% in the quarter.
Western Digital's (WDC) enterprise SSD revenue began to rise noticeably in the second quarter of 2022, thanks to the adoption of its PCIe products by North American server OEMs. Despite this, WDC reported a sequential decrease in revenue for the fourth quarter of the year to US$493 million due to a reduction in North American customers' procurement quantities, TrendForce indicated.
Kioxia's performance benefited mainly from its position as the primary supplier of SAS SSDs in the fourth quarter of 2022, TrendForce said. Kioxia was able to limit its sequential revenue decline despite lower-than-expected order volume because SAS products have a higher unit price than PCIe products.
According to TrendForce, WDC, Kioxia, and Micron Technology rounded out the top five, with 13%, 12.9%, and 8.1% market shares in the fourth quarter of 2022, respectively.
