Sony & Samsung Cut Deal
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Samsung is negotiating a $1.8 billion contract to supply NAND-based, flash-memory chips to Sony, according to reports. The move follows another multi million dollar Flash Memory deal with Apple late in 2005.

The order from Sony could account for one-fifth of Samsung’s NAND-based flash-memory production, exceeding the value of its chip sales to Apple, said Chung Chang Won, an analyst at Daewoo Securities Co., in a report from Bloomberg

Another report, which cited an unidentified Samsung official, said that Sony would use the chips in its new MP3 music players. A contract could be signed during the first half of next year, according to the reports.

Samsung, the world’s largest NAND-based flash-memory maker, recently signed a major supply contract with Apple. But in October Samsung blamed the South Korean Fair Trade Commission (FTC) for killing a deal it was putting together to build a $3.8 billion joint-venture flash memory wafer fab with Apple.

Then, last month, Micron Technology and Intel announced plans to create a joint venture to manufacture NAND flash memory for use in consumer electronics, removable storage and handheld communications devices, and in particular, to manufacture for Apple.