Micron exited the consumer DRAM market in December 2025, leaving Samsung and SK Hynix as the only two major suppliers. It is now rumored that SK Hynix may follow Micron's lead, stopping the production of consumer DRAM and NAND chips.
The thing is, this is happening precisely because manufacturers are giving a flying fuck. They’re seeing that the AI bubble is about to burst, and that this increased demand won’t last for long. So why spend tons of money on expanding production capacity when said capacity wouldn’t even be used?
Not to mention that the current pricing bump is entirely on the OEMs, not the ODMs (ODM here being the DRAM manufacturers, OEMs being the RAM module manufacturers). OEMs have already bought and paid for the DRAM they’re selling right now, as it takes generally 2-3 months from manufacturing for the product to hit the shelves, and DRAM modules are usually bought at least 6 months, but usually 12-18 months ahead. Meaning these fuckers bought the DRAM cheap, saw the possibility of there being scarcity in the future, took a guess on how much they will need to inflate prices to reduce demand… And immediately jumped to those prices because if morons will pay £1000 for 64GB of RAM instead of £200, even though the production cost is still at £50… Well that’s just “good business” to maximise profits, innit?
The thing is, this is happening precisely because manufacturers are giving a flying fuck. They’re seeing that the AI bubble is about to burst, and that this increased demand won’t last for long. So why spend tons of money on expanding production capacity when said capacity wouldn’t even be used?
Not to mention that the current pricing bump is entirely on the OEMs, not the ODMs (ODM here being the DRAM manufacturers, OEMs being the RAM module manufacturers). OEMs have already bought and paid for the DRAM they’re selling right now, as it takes generally 2-3 months from manufacturing for the product to hit the shelves, and DRAM modules are usually bought at least 6 months, but usually 12-18 months ahead. Meaning these fuckers bought the DRAM cheap, saw the possibility of there being scarcity in the future, took a guess on how much they will need to inflate prices to reduce demand… And immediately jumped to those prices because if morons will pay £1000 for 64GB of RAM instead of £200, even though the production cost is still at £50… Well that’s just “good business” to maximise profits, innit?