Numonyx beats Spansion in Q2 NOR flash war

Numonyx's NOR flash memory in the Q2 rose to $380 million, up $50 million from $330 million in Q1. In contrast, Spansion's revenue declined by $22 million in Q2 to $376 million, down from $398 million in the first. This put Numonyx $4 million ahead of Spansion and gave it a 0.4 percentage point market lead.

"During the past five years, Spansion and Numonyx have fought tooth and nail for the No. 1 position in the NOR flash memory market, each alternating in the top spot several times over " said Michael Yang, senior analyst for storage and mobile memory for iSuppli. "In Q2 09, it was Numonyx's turn to pull ahead and take its place as the top dog."

"The battle between Spansion and Numonyx took an interesting turn in 2009, when Spansion decided to declare Chapter 11 and focus on the embedded memory segment rather than the wireless market," Yang said. "That left the wireless segment wide open, and suddenly other NOR companies scrambled to secure as much additional business in the handset market as they could. Those that took the greatest advantage of it were Numonyx and Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. Numonyx is likely to continue to pull away from Spansion during the company's reorganization."

Wireless, specifically cellphones, represents the largest single market for NOR flash memory, storing code in such products.

Samsung's Q2 revenue surged by 19.4 percent to $117 million, up from $98 million in Q1. The company maintained its third-place ranking.

Macronix International and Silicon Storage Technology rounded out the top five NOR suppliers, with each gaining revenue in Q2.

While Spansion is facing a challenging reorganization, iSuppli believes the company will remain a strong player in the flash memory market. Spansion will rebound along with the economy and be in a stable position to reemerge as one of the continued strong players in the flash market, although it will play in different markets than before.