Global memory-chip price increases continue to intensify, putting fresh pressure on the smartphone supply chain. With DRAM and NAND prices rising across the board, several brands have halted new procurement rounds as suppliers request increases approaching 50%.
South Korea's memory chip industry is enjoying its strongest upturn in years, with soaring demand for high-bandwidth memory and AI-related DRAM pushing inventories at Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix to multi-year lows.
d-Matrix completed a US$275 million Series C round in early November, raising its valuation to US$2 billion, and is speeding up the commercialisation of its 3D In-Memory Compute (3D IMC) technology and its next-generation Raptor inference accelerator for data centres as generative AI inference chips evolve quickly.
South Korea's KB Securities expects Samsung Electronics to capture as much as 40% of Nvidia's supply share for its next-generation HBM4 high-bandwidth memory by 2026, a shift that could reshape the competitive landscape of the AI memory market. Combined with projections that SK Hynix will sell out its memory lineup that year, the firm forecasts that the two Korean chipmakers' combined market capitalization could surpass KRW1,500 trillion (US$1.02 billion).
South Korea's top memory chip makers are entering what industry executives call a full-scale "supercycle," as Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix report steep inventory reductions through the third quarter of 2025.
AI has pushed the memory industry into a growth cycle. Etron Technology President Elvis Deng stated that memory supply is now in short supply across the board. DDR4, LPDDR4, and DDR3 shortages will be difficult to ease in the short term, and are expected to persist into the second half of 2026—2027.
Samsung's P5 plant at the second campus in Pyeongtaek, South Korea, will begin construction, with operations expected to start in 2028. Due to the weak memory market, P5 was previously put on hold. With the memory supercycle emerging, analysts state that the start of P5 construction means subsequent investment plans have also begun to take shape.
Orient Semiconductor Electronics (OSE) said the global memory industry has shifted decisively into a "seller's market," prompting the company to pass higher costs to customers and accelerate capacity expansion.
Benefiting from the artificial intelligence (AI) boom driving strong semiconductor and server exports, Taiwan's economic growth forecast for 2025 has been revised up to 5.94% by the Taiwan Institute of Economic Research (TIER). Supply chains that caught the first wave of Nvidia-led AI demand have seen significant profit growth since the second half of 2023.
The memory buying surge escalated into the fourth quarter of 2025, sparking panic purchases across the supply chain. According to market sources, brands and system vendors such as Asus and MSI have been aggressively stocking up.
SK Hynix is reportedly set to begin ordering equipment for its 12-layer sixth-generation high-bandwidth memory (HBM4) as early as November 2025. Considering the construction schedule of its Cheongju M15X plant in South Korea, the equipment is expected to start being installed gradually in early 2026.
SMIC warns that an emerging memory shortage could disrupt production of cars, smartphones, and consumer electronics as early as 2026. Co-CEO Zhao Haijun said Chinese manufacturers have become more cautious about first-quarter 2026 orders because they are unsure they can secure sufficient memory. Rising demand from AI workloads is expected to push memory prices higher and add to market uncertainty.
Global Mixed-mode Technology (GMT) held its earnings call on November 12, 2025, revealing that early customer stocking in the first half of 2025 dampened the traditional peak season effect in the second half of 2025. GMT reported a significant gross margin decline in the third quarter due to reduced inventory write-back gains and currency headwinds.
The memory market's ongoing shortage-and-price surge continues to accelerate, lifting the broader sector and boosting earnings for DRAM manufacturers, module suppliers, memory packaging and testing houses, and BT substrate makers, as rush orders surge. The passive component segment has also emerged as a key beneficiary of this upcycle.
The global AI boom is driving up smartphone and tablet production costs, as memory suppliers divert more capacity toward high-bandwidth memory (HBM) for AI accelerators. Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix have steadily reduced PC and mobile DRAM output to prioritize HBM, Fntimes reports, leaving device makers across Asia — including China's budget smartphone brands — with little choice but to raise prices.
Samsung Electronics is poised for a commanding performance in the advanced memory sector, with analysts forecasting the tech giant could seize 40 percent of the lucrative HBM4 market by 2026. This anticipated dominance is underpinned by a sharp resurgence in memory prices and pivotal supply agreements for Nvidia's next-generation GPUs, setting the stage for a dramatic spike in profitability.
ADATA Technology Co. (ADATA) has reported record-breaking financial results for the third quarter of 2025, marking a clean sweep of quarterly highs in operating gross profit, operating income, and net profit. These gains contributed to a substantial rise in the company's year-to-date earnings, surpassing its full-year performance from 2024 well ahead of schedule.
The rise of artificial intelligence (AI) is accelerating the shift from conceptual smart manufacturing to real-world application, with Qisda chairman Peter Chen forecasting the debut of humanoid robots in 2026, primarily within smart manufacturing environments. These factories represent the first viable domain for humanoid robot integration, marking a significant step in industrial automation.
Samsung Chairman Lee Jae-yong's right-hand man, Chung Hyun-ho, has suddenly retired. Chung led the Business Support Task Force (TF), and Lee is expected to take full control of Samsung's personnel and outline a new blueprint for the company's future to restore its former glory.
Samsung will continue investment in the Phase 4 production line at its Pyeongtaek campus, converting the facility from foundry to 1c DRAM production. The latest monthly capacity is estimated at 80,000 wafers. Additionally, the previously postponed Phase 2 (Ph2) line is expected to resume investment in 2026 as a foundry production line.
The AI boom has caused memory giants to concentrate production on HBM, resulting in a shortage of general-purpose DRAM and high prices. According to Chosun Biz, DRAM prices are expected to continue rising as a product of the supply shortage. Analyses indicate that SK Hynix's general-purpose DRAM operating profit margin could reach 70%, drawing attention to its future developments.
Taiwan-based semiconductor tester and packager ChipMOS Technologies swung back to profit in the third quarter of 2025, buoyed by a sharp rebound in memory demand. Chairman Shih-Jye Cheng said the company expects the momentum to strengthen further, predicting that 2026 will be "a good year across the board" for the memory industry.
South Korea's semiconductor industry, boosted by AI-driven HBM memory demand, faces challenges as China's CXMT speeds up HBM3 production and Tesla plans to create its own wafer fab for chip self-sufficiency.
US memory giant Micron will postpone the commissioning of its first two fabs in Clay, New York, by 2–3 years and will reallocate part of the funding from the CHIPS and Science Act to accelerate construction of a new fab in Boise, Idaho.
