South Korea’s top semiconductor manufacturers, Samsung Electronics and SK hynix, are expected to enjoy a super cycle in the global memory chip market until 2023, industry sources said Friday.

According to international market tracker IC Insights, global sales of memory chips will reach a record high of $180.4 billion in 2022.

The record for global memory sales was $163.3 billion in 2018, when manufacturers benefited from price hikes on rising demand during a so-called super memory cycle.

The figure dropped 32 percent to record $110.4 billion in 2019 but started a recovery, backed by increasing demand for chips and mobile devices in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The market report said global sales of memory chips this year were expected to reach $155.2 billion, up 23 percent on-year, supported by increasing prices of dynamic random-access memory products.

IC Insights anticipated that sales of DRAM products would account for around 56 percent of global memory chip sales, while NAND flash products would account for some 41 percent.

Sales will continue to jump 16 percent to $180.4 billion in 2022 and another 22 percent to $219.6 billion in 2023, the report added.

Expectations also ran high on strong earnings by Korean chip giants Samsung Electronics and SK hynix so far this year.

Samsung is currently the world’s largest DRAM chipmaker with a 42 percent market share, followed by SK hynix with 29 percent.

Samsung is also the top NAND flash manufacturer with a 32 percent market share. SK hynix is expected to follow Samsung Electronics after the company completes acquisition of Intel’s NAND unit.

By Shim Woo-hyun (ws@heraldcorp.com)