According to a report released by TrendForce, Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix (including its subsidiaries) both saw their sales of flash memory chips (NAND Flash) drop in the third quarter due to weakening demand due to the economic downturn.

Specifically, Samsung Electronics' sales fell 28.1% month-on-month to $4.3 billion. Its market share fell by 1.6 percentage points month-on-month to 31.4%, but it still ranks first in the world. During the same period, the market share of Japan's Kioxia increased by 5 percentage points month-on-month to 20.6%, replacing SK Hynix and ranking second. SK hynix's sales decreased by 29.8% month-on-month to US$2.54 billion, and its market share fell to 18.5%, ranking third.

TrendForce pointed out that the NAND Flash market still fell short of weak demand in the third quarter, and shipments in both consumer electronics and servers were worse than expected, resulting in a 18.3% decline in NAND Flash prices in the third quarter.

In addition, the overall economy continues to be weak, personal and corporate spending has turned conservative, and corporate purchasing momentum has also stalled, which has spread inventory pressure to original factories, and together with sales pressure has increased sharply.

In the third quarter, the supplier's bit shipments decreased by 6.7% quarter-on-quarter, and the average unit selling price continued to decline. The overall NAND Flash industry revenue was approximately US$13.71 billion, a quarter-on-quarter decline of 24.3%.