Micron Technology, Inc. (NASDAQ:MU) is a $45 billion (by market cap) major player in the random access memory market. But in 1978, it was four people in the basement of a dental office in Boise, Idaho.

Today, its dynamic random access memory (DRAM), and negative-AND (NAND) memory are the building blocks of the of the state of the art solid state drives, cloud servers and mobile telecom that make up the core of the digital economy. And MU stock shows the story of the ride. But now that story is changing.

When you think about computing, you generally think about managing files or watching videos on the internet. Those processes don’t require a lot of high-performance equipment.

And when you think of portable memory, you think of, say, a thumb drive or an SD memory card you pop into your digital camera or phone.

But it’s so much more now.

Now, these “flash” memories are powering the next leg of the digital age. They are the core ingredients in cloud computing (an industry that should hit $162 billion by 2020, according to Forbes). They’re also fundamental to the current and next generation telecom services that support mobile computing and phone services.

The simple fact is, we’re at another inflection point with technology and how it is transforming our lives. And flash memory is one of the main drivers.

There are certainly other flash memory makers out there. But MU has always been a quality source of reliable products.

In the past, the biggest challenge most memory makers had was how cyclical the market was. There would be big demand and the stocks would soar, and then demand would slow and the stocks would tank.

But at this point, the technology has caught up to the supply. Because there are so many new uses for flash memory, and the original uses are still in demand, the boom and bust cycle is fast becoming a story of the past.

And the boom with a long tail is underway.

For example, in late September, MU released its fiscal-fourth-quarter and full-year numbers.

For the quarter, revenue was up 91% compared to the same quarter last year. Gross margin went from 18% to 51%. Operating income went from a 1% loss to a 41% gain. The fiscal year was equally impressive.

With those kinds of results, you can see why the stock is up nearly 80%. But the crazy thing is, after such massive numbers and such bullish performance, MU is trading at a current price-to-earnings ratio of 17.

That’s not a typo. Its current P/E is 17. And that’s largely because of its past spiky nature. This at a time when solid state drive maker Western Digital Corp (NASDAQ: WDC) — a technology that relies on flash memory – trades at a current PE of 63.

Louis Navellier is a renowned growth investor. He is the editor of five investing newsletters: Blue Chip Growth, Emerging Growth, Ultimate Growth, Family Trust and Platinum Growth. His most popular service, Blue Chip Growth, has a track record of beating the market 3:1 over the last 14 years. He uses a combination of quantitative and fundamental analysis to identify market-beating stocks. Mr. Navellier has made his proven formula accessible to investors via his free, online stock rating tool, PortfolioGrader.com. Louis Navellier may hold some of the aforementioned securities in one or more of his newsletters.