DRAMs used in smartphones are set for remarkable triple-digit growth in shipments this year, outpacing the expansion of the entire DRAM market by a factor of three, according to an IHS iSuppli.
Smartphone DRAM shipments, as measured in 1Gbit-equivalent units, are expected to reach 1.7 billion in 2011, up 157.2% from 2010.
By 2015, shipments will increase to 13.9 billion units, up 700% from 2011.
"Compared to this year's stunning DRAM growth in smartphones, a shipment expansion amounting to a much less spectacular 50% is expected for the total DRAM market, which is dominated by sales to the PC business," said Clifford Leimbach, analyst for memory demand forecasting at IHS.
These growth numbers explain why DRAM manufacturers see the cellphone market as crucial.
Smartphones' share of total DRAM consumption will grow to 7.6% this year. This will expand to 16% in 2015, said the analyst.
Four smartphones profiled
In at least four recently released smartphones, dissections by the IHS iSuppli Teardown Service revealed the devices had larger quantities of DRAM.
The Xperia PLAY from Sony Ericsson, for instance, had 512 megabytes (MB) of DRAM, while the Galaxy Indulge from Samsung Electronics featured 576MB.
The iPhone 4 from Apple had DRAM amounting to 544MB, while the Thunderbolt from HTC had the highest level at 768MB.
In comparison, a device released last year, such as the SGH T939--an Android-operated, touch-screen smartphone from Samsung--had DRAM content of only 128MB.
To learn more about this topic, see the IHS iSuppli report entitled: "Smartphones, Smart Memory Markets."
