(Reuters) - Japan's Elpida Memory Inc posted a wider-than-expected quarterly loss and said it is in talks on an aid package as the chipmaker wrestles with a tough market and imminent debt repayments that have raised pressure on it to seek an equity tie-up.

DRAM memory chip makers are struggling as falling prices and huge investments to stay competitive saddle them with massive losses, forcing them to consider steps such as tie-ups to gain scale, move into higher-value chips or seek financial help.

Elpida, Japan's last remaining maker of dynamic random-access memory, used in personal computers, has been rushing to develop more power-efficient chips used in smartphones and tablet PCs, but as losses mount pressure on it to engineer a turnaround are rising.

The chipmaker reported on Thursday an operating loss of 43.8 billion yen ($575 million) in the October-December quarter, compared with a loss of 26.9 billion yen a year earlier, and steeper than the average estimate of a 37.65 billion yen loss in a poll of six analysts by Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.

The company is battling falling prices, a strong yen, and loss of market share to better-funded South Korean rivals Samsung Electronics and Hynix Semiconductor.

It gave no full-year forecasts, although public broadcaster NHK reported on Thursday that Elpida was likely to post a 120 billion yen ($1.58 billion) net loss for the year to end-March, higher than an average 110 billion yen net loss forecast in a poll of 17 analysts by Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.

The chipmaker is seeking a tie-up with Micron Technology of the United States and Taiwan's Nanya Technology to shore up its balance sheet, media reports have said.

Elpida President Yukio Sakamoto, at a news conference on Thursday, declined to comment on specific tie-up partners but stressed the need for his company to be able to remain strong independently.

"If Elpida can't stay solid, I don't think a tie-up would work out well," he said.

The company said it was in talks with its banks and the trade ministry on an aid package and believed an agreement was possible by end-March, when it faces key debt repayment deadlines.

DIM OUTLOOK

But Mitsushige Akino, chief fund manager at Ichiyoshi Investment Management, said investors would remain cautious toward the stock.

"Elpida will remain a difficult company. Potential investors cannot decide whether or not to invest in Elpida until they can see what the market outlook is. And the market outlook is dim."

He was also unimpressed by the company's confidence on an aid deal.

"The situation is still risky. The company will have to rely on short-term financing for a while and it will remain unstable."

Elpida, which has repeatedly raised capital to keep pace with its bigger rivals, needed to repay 110 billion yen on April 2, but has 50-60 billion yen in cash on hand, and is in the process of gathering another 50 billion yen via pre-payments and capital ties from clients, President Sakamoto said.

Its lenders have given it until this month to devise a turnaround plan, sources have said.

Ahead of the results, Elpida shares ended 4 percent higher on Thursday at 337 yen, compared with a 0.8 percent rise in Tokyo's benchmark Nikkei average.

The stock hit a record low of 297 yen in early January as worries mounted about the company's future, but has partly recovered as its prospects of finding an equity partner improved.

Makers of DRAM chips have been hit by slumping market prices from a weak global economy and falling sales as consumers switch to tablets that use flash memory instead of DRAM chips.

But Sakamoto said he believed the firm could return to a profit in the next financial year, in part as cellphone-related chip demand rises from a growing market for mobile devices.

Earlier on Thursday, Hynix reported its second consecutive quarterly loss, hit by tumbling computer chip prices as consumers ditched desktops and notebook PCs in favor of tablets and smartphones.

On Monday, Nanya denied any intention of joining a possible tie-up between Elpida and Micron, following a report last week that Elpida would seek to eventually include Nanya's parent company, Formosa Plastics Group, in the deal.

Micron and Elpida each held around 12 percent of the DRAM market as of the end of the third quarter of 2011, while Nanya had around 4 percent. Samsung dominated the sector with a 45 percent market share, while Hynix held around 20 percent.

($1 = 76.12 Japanese yen)