Micron Technology has redrawn the battle lines in the DRam space by re-emering as a top three-ranked vendor, according to iSuppli.

ISuppli’s preliminary first-quarter figures show US firm Micron increasing its share of global DRam revenue to 14.6 per cent, up from 13.8 per cent in Q4 and up from 11.3 per cent in the first quarter of 2008.

Nam Hyung Kim, chief analyst, memory ICs at iSuppli, said: “Micron’s comeback poses a risk to the health of the DRam industry and threatens the leading players in the market. Until 2003, the company had been a solid number two, behind Samsung, but had seen its share decline due to its effort to diversify its product line beyond DRam and its lateness to invest in 300mm fabs.

“Micron’s resurgence could trigger a DRam market share war – which would drive down prices and adversely affect industry profitability in the future.”

Kim added that iSuppli believes Micron will gain market share with additional fab access.

The DRam industry continues to suffer from overproduction and excess inventories, iSuppli claimed, which is causing prices and revenue to drop.

Global DRam revenue in Q1 declined by 20.1 per cent compared to Q4, and by 44.1 per cent compared to Q1 2008.

The DRAM-per-megabyte average selling price in the first quarter declined by eight per cent and shipments of megabyte units dropped by 13 per cent compared to Q4.

In contrast, megabyte unit shipments grew 10 per cent in the first quarter of 2009 compared to the same period in 2008, indicating that more production cuts are needed to accelerate market recovery during the worldwide recession, iSuppli claimed.

All the top 10 DRam makers suffered sequential declines in revenue, except for Nanya, which showed a 2.7 per cent increase. Nanya entered the top five ranking partly because of Qimonda’s move to halt all DRam production.

Micron limited its revenue decline to 15.4 per cent compared to Q4 and Samsung managed to contain its revenue decline to 8.4 per cent in Q1, giving it market share of 34.3 per cent.