The RAM Crisis Keeps Getting Worse

Hi, welcome to another episode of Cold

Fusion. Imagine walking into an

electronic store a few years from now.

[music] The shelves are stocked, the

displays still look familiar, but the

prices make you pause. A laptop costs

more than you expected. The release of a

gaming console is postponed again. A

phone upgrade quietly disappears from

the lineup. And as a consumer, you don't

immediately know why. There are no

dramatic headlines, no single event you

can point to, just a feeling that buying

technology has become more complicated

than it used to be. This future scenario

is already beginning to unfold. It's the

computer enthusiasts around the world

who began to feel it first. But why is

all of this happening? Well, behind the

scenes, a critical component of modern

computing is under pressure. It's called

random access memory or [music] RAM.

It's the kind of hardware most people

never think about, but it's vital to

almost every electronic product we use.

For the past few years, trillions of

dollars have been flowing into AI data

centers across the world. And for those

data centers to run smoothly, one of the

most valuable components is memory or

RAM. In this new AI gold rush, RAM has

become the shovel. [music]

It's the one component that every single

serious player needs to keep digging.

According to multiple industry reports,

Open AI has already secured an estimated

40% of global high bandwidth RAM. Right

now, the shift in global RAM production

is affecting computing. But if you're

not a gamer and you think you're safe,

think again. The price hikes will expand

into a large array of electronic

devices, artificial intelligence, and

specifically [music] the absolutely

insatiable demand for HBM or high

bandwidth memory used in AI training

hardware. Now, to be clear, HBM [music]

is not the same stuff that's in your

laptop. It's a far different and more

expensive product, but all memory shares

the [music] same wafer fabrication

process, and it's a zero sum game. Every

wafer allocated to an HBM stack for an

Nvidia GPU is a wafer not making it into

the LPDDR on your next laptop.

Meanwhile, Nvidia's CEO Jensen Hang was

in Soul recently, reportedly chugging

soju and demolishing Korean fried

chicken with Samsung memory executives.

The purpose of his visit was very clear.

Secure the RAM, lock it in, and make

sure competitors don't get to it first.

But why meet Samsung executives?

Specifically, the South Korean company

now makes more money selling RAM to data

centers than it does selling phones.

Other RAM manufacturers have decided to

stop selling to consumers altogether. AI

data centers are just [music] that much

more profitable. That detail matters. It

shows where priorities are shifting. If

that shift continues, every consumer

product that depends on memory will feel

the pressure. Phones, gaming consoles,

TVs, laptops, you name it. On the other

hand, the country that's best positioned

to take advantage of this memory issue

may not be the United States or South

Korea, but China. In today's episode,

we're going to take a look at how memory

became the choke [music] point of the AI

era, the companies behind it, and why

the next technology shock may arrive

without a single line of code changing.

Let's get into it.

>> You are watching Till Fusion TV.

>> We see data centers as the most exciting

asset class. Meta is building a 2 gawatt

plus data center that is so large it

would cover a significant part of

Manhattan.

>> Take a look at this chart. It shows the

price of DDR5 RAM over recent months.

For a long time, prices barely moved.

They even fell slightly. Then very

suddenly at the start of last year, it

went parabolic. If you've been trying to

build a PC recently, you already know

what's going on.

One single 256 GB RAM kit can now cost

more than a flagship GPU. In some cases,

more than an RTX 5090. And that

parabolic move is where the story

begins. We'll come back to what really

caused it later. But for now, let's look

at what RAM really is. If you're

watching this episode, you already know

the basics, but here's a quick

refresher. RAM is short-term working

memory. It's where data sits while a

computer is actively doing something.

Opening apps, loading game assets,

editing video, even switching between

browser tabs. All of that happens on

RAM. As computers do more, RAM matters

more. In AI data centers, however, RAM

is mission critical. The memory used to

train and run large AI models operates

under very different conditions from the

RAM inside your laptop or gaming PC.

These systems run consistently,

sometimes for weeks at a time. A small

error at home might freeze an app, but

in a data center, that same error can

crash the entire training run and waste

millions of dollars in compute time.

That's why servers rely on ECC memory or

error correcting code RAM. Stability

comes first. Slightly higher latency is

fine, but crashing is not. As AI demand

surged, more manufacturing capacity

began flowing towards server grade

memory. Who cares about consumer RAM?

But there's a massive problem. Only a

few companies can make that sort of

thing. At this point, you might be

wondering something. There's so many

brands of RAM you can buy, it doesn't

look like the market is controlled by

scarcity.

Even though RAM sticks are sold under

dozens of names, the most important part

of the module is the memory chip

themselves. Those small black rectangles

soldered onto the stick. And here's the

key point. Around 93% of those chips

come from just three companies. They are

Samsung, SKH Highix and Micron.

>> I don't remember anybody forecasting

that all of a sudden AI data centers

will be buying up so much of the world's

RAM that the rest of us would be scrging

for leftovers. These three companies

control 93% of the world's supply of

RAM. Of these three, one of them just

said, "We're done with consumer

business. We're just going to focus on

enterprise now. We're going to focus on

data centers because that's where the

money is." And of the other two, Samsung

and SKH Highix, they may have

contributed as much as 40% of the

world's entire supply of memory to a

single project at OpenAI going on right

now to create a massive set of AI

infrastructure there. When the world's

electronics depends on just three

companies, the system becomes fragile.

One disruption, one miscalculation, and

the whole thing starts to wobble. A

tightly balanced supply meets a sudden

series of shocks.

As we mentioned earlier, in October

2025, Open AI quietly locked up an

estimated 40% of global DRAM production

for its long-term AI infrastructure.

Then in late 2025, Micron announced that

it was stepping away from consumer

crucial RAM [music] and SSDs. Its focus

was going to be AI and enterprise

buyers. The leftover consumer stock was

expected to sell out by early 2026. And

with that single move, the entire market

shook. What followed was a scramble.

Other tech giants realized that the

window was closing. In January, Korean

media reported that US big tech

companies were staying in long-term

hotels around Pango and Pyong,

desperately begging Samsung and SKH

Highix for DRAM allocations. The

situation was reportedly so dire that

industry insiders were even calling them

DRAM beggars. Google reportedly tried to

secure additional high bandwidth memory

or HBM. This is a specialized form of

RAM designed to sit right next to AI

accelerators. In Google's case, those

accelerators are TPUs or tensor

processing units. Google's custom chips

that power much of its AI training. The

response they received was blunt.

[music]

Supply simply wasn't available.

According to reports, the executives

responsible for securing that memory

were later fired. Microsoft didn't fare

much better. Also in a panic, executives

flew to South Korea to negotiate

directly with SKH Highex and the talks

went badly. One executive reportedly

stormed out of the meeting. This was the

environment during the price spike that

you saw earlier. So given everything

happening across the supply chain, it

leads to an obvious question. If demand

is so high and prices are rising, why

don't memory manufacturers simply make

more chips?

Why don't they just make more? Well, for

a couple reasons. First, as I've alluded

to before, the current fabs that are

used to make cuttingedge chips have a

finite capacity. They already run around

the clock with some of the world's most

finely tuned supply management and

highly trained engineers overseeing

their operation. It's not as simple as

just adding a production shift or

turning the machine up to 200%. Those

are delicate operations and if something

goes wrong in the middle of a batch, it

could be weeks or even months to build

it again from scratch. So, they're not

going to change things all willy-nilly.

And second is that even if they could

boost production to meet demand, both

SKHakes and Samsung have publicly stated

they don't plan to because they don't

want to. That clip explains the core of

the problem well. Once you accept that

today's factories are already running

flat out, the obvious follow-up is why

not just build new ones, this is where

things slow down. People inside the

industry are very clear about the

timeline. One memory chip executive told

Reuters that even after a company

decides to expand, it still takes at

least 2 years for new capacity to

actually start producing chips. And

that's the optimistic version where

everything goes according to plan. In

tech, 2 years is equivalent to the time

between now and the Egyptian pyramids.

Building a fab means committing billions

of dollars today based on what you think

the demand would look like several years

from now. And who knows what AI demand

would look like then. Everything could

pan out or it could be a bubble. Even

Sam Olman, Open AI CEO, has openly

acknowledged that the current AI frenzy

may turn out to be a bubble.

>> It's an interesting [music] time for the

world's most prominent AI CEO to say

this. And so late last week, Sam Alman

um had a dinner with various

journalists. Um it was on the record and

the verge published this quote. Um so

[snorts] Sam Alman said when bubbles

happen smart people get over excited

about a kernel of truth. If you look at

most of the bubbles in history like the

tech bubble there was a real thing. Tech

was really important. The internet was a

really big deal. People got over

excited. Are we in a phase where

investors as a whole are over excited

about AI? My opinion is yes. Is AI the

most important thing to happen in a very

long time? My opinion is also yes. Um so

that was Sam Alman saying we are in a

bubble um and investors are over

excited. He said elsewhere um that he

thinks some people will probably lose a

lot of money.

>> There's also plenty of early evidence to

suggest that open AI themselves will

struggle financially in the future and

that uncertainty matters. If AI demand

cools faster than expected in the next 2

years, it makes little sense for memory

manufacturers to pour billions of

dollars into equipment. Now, they're

being extra cautious [music] because

they've seen this movie before. In the

mid-2010s, memory demand surged as

smartphones went mainstream. This was

especially true when cheap mobile data

exploded in fast growing markets like

India. [music] DRAM manufacturers ramped

up production. They were convinced that

the growth would last, but it didn't.

Demand cooled, the market flipped into

over supply, and prices collapsed. It's

a painful memory that still hangs over

the industry. [music]

So instead of a sudden flood of new

factories to meet demand, what you get

is hesitation, careful commitments, and

a lot of waiting. Under current

conditions of increased demand, the

impact is massive, and we're already

[music] starting to see it.

By this point, the effects are no longer

subtle. Inside the industry, executives

have stopped speaking in hypotheticals.

SK Group chairman Chay Taywan said,

quote, "These days, we're receiving many

requests for memory suppliers from so

many companies that we're worried about

how we'll be able to handle them all. If

we fail to supply them, they could face

a situation where they can't do business

at all." End quote. All of that pressure

is already spiraling into the real

world. According to Reuters, Japanese

electronic retailers have begun limiting

how many hard drives their consumers can

buy. Chinese smartphone manufacturers

are openly warning of price increases.

Apple is already deep in it as well.

They're reporting paying a 230% premium

for the 12 GB LP DDR5X memory used in

its iPhone 17 Pro models. Chips that

once cost $25 to $29 are now closer to

$70 each on every phone. PC makers are

facing the same reality. Lenovo and HP

are scrambling to secure memory supply

as shortages are expected to last until

2027. Dell, Lenovo, and Framework have

also announced price increases. The RAM

apocalypse continues. As RAM prices

continue to rise, Dell, Lenovo, and

Framework have all announced price

increases and other changes [music]

due to DRAM shortage with Trend Force

even predicting that Dell and Lenovo may

be going backwards and limiting devices

to only have 8 gigs of RAM. According to

IDC research, in 2026, the whole PC

market could decline by 4.9 to 8.9% and

[music] smartphones 2.9 to 5.2%

respectively. Consoles are under

pressure, too. PlayStation 6 and the

next generation Xbox could face delays.

Nintendo has already lost around 14

billion in market value amid concerns

over memory costs affecting the next

switch. Among [music] the consumers,

gamers are feeling it the most. They

rely on high performance GPUs, but those

GPUs are rumored to push towards $5,000

price tags. [music] A recent report

indicates that Nvidia is going to be

pushing the prices of RTX 5090 up to 5K.

[music]

Uh, this is still an unconfirmed rumor

from an insider source in South Korea.

From what I can understand, that's kind

of like, you know, boots on the ground

that's talking about it right now, which

is where this headline is stemming from.

Previous price was 2K. This is over

double.

That's That's an awfully uh hard bargain

there. 5,000 clams. I would imagine most

sensible sane human beings on the planet

would be pretty upset about that.

Meanwhile, there's some dire warnings

out there. CEO of the fabulous RAM

designer Fison states [music] that many

consumer electronics manufacturers quote

will go bankrupt or exit product lines

end quote by the end of 2026 [music] due

to the AI memory crisis. He claims that

mobile phone production will be reduced

by 200 to 250 million units and PC and

TV production will also be significantly

reduced. We'll see if that pans out, but

it does indicate some serious [music]

supply disruption.

At this point, we need to talk about

Nvidia. The company built its rise on

gaming GPUs, but now sits at the center

of the AI boom, and they're one of the

biggest beneficiaries. According to the

publication, The Information, Nvidia

will pause new gaming GPU releases for

consumers in 2026 due to the shortage.

It's a slap in the face for gamers.

Meanwhile, their latest Blackwell

systems are designed for data centers,

not desktops. Each rack carries enormous

amounts of memory, up to 864 GB, and

that's because modern AI models demand

it. Multiply that across hundreds of

systems that companies like Anthropic

and Microsoft want to deploy, and the

effect is obvious. Vast chunks of global

memory supply disappear into data

centers long before consumer hardware

even gets a sniff. All of this leaves

the market in an unusual place. The

companies that built the modern tech

stack are quietly reshuffling their

priorities. To consumers, Nvidia feels

like a modern Judas, but that's just the

way it is. But there's also a glaring

problem with the data center buildout

itself. What happens in 2 to four years

when the very chips that have ruined the

global RAM supply are hopelessly

outdated for their original purpose?

It's a question worth asking. And then

on top of this, you have all the

clueless investors jumping in on the

hype. Frankly, it's insane. So the

problem with data centers is everyone

thinks that data centers are real

[music] estate. And a lot of people do

real estate. Data centers are not real

estate. The common joke in the industry

now is someone says, "I'm going to have

100 megawatts of capacity for you and

I'm going to have it in three months.

Are you willing to sign?" And then you

ask a question like, "Well, um, what's

your uptime?" And they're like, "I don't

know, whatever the power grid is."

You're like, "Wait, what? Where are your

generators?" Oh, I haven't ordered

those. I'll order them now. You know

that there's a 90-month lead time on

generators right now? Oh, really?

>> 90.

And then the next question is, where are

you getting the water from? Wait, data

centers need water? I thought it was a

bunch of chips. What? What do you mean

water? So, there's a bunch of people

have no idea what they're doing going

into it because they think it's real

estate. And so, those people are now

building an over supply of data centers,

but they're not really building them.

So, they're fake data centers [music]

that people think are real.

For now, there's no obvious release

valve, but there is a dark horse in this

story. China. Just as pressure mounts on

traditional centers of chip production,

China is only a few years behind the

cutting edge. Could the giant from the

east swoop in and change the RAM

apocalypse story? Possibly, but not

overnight. China's leading DRAM

challenger, CXMT, has recently announced

that it's able to manufacture DDR5

memory. On paper, that matters. But

there is a catch. Timing. Most analysts

believe that CXMT is still 2 or 3 years

away from reaching the scale, yields,

and consistency needed to meaningfully

shift global supply. By then, today's

contracts will already be locked in.

Those contracts matter more than most

people realize. SKH Highix has

reportedly sold through much of its

production well into 2026. That means

that even if AI demand cools or the

bubble deflates, the memory is already

spoken for. Buyers who locked in early

will still be expected to take delivery,

often at prices set during today's peak.

So even with new players entering the

field, relief arrives slowly, and when

it does, it's not going to feel evenly

distributed.

So I've been covering neural networks on

this channel for over a decade. Before

Chat GPT and before the hype, I was

really fascinated by the raw potential

of this technology. But what we're

seeing now just feels different. louder,

messier, harder to justify. Between the

water usage, the electricity demand, AI

induced psychosis, non-consentual

generated images, and the growing flood

of loweffort AI content, it's fair to

pause and ask a difficult question. Are

the benefits of consumer generated AI

still worth the cost, especially when

the fallout isn't abstract anymore? So,

what's your take on all of this? Do you

think that the RAM shortage is just a

necessary step to get to where we need

to be? Or have tech CEOs become a bit

overzealous and this is all a big

mistake? Let me know your thoughts in

the comment section below. It's

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I'll catch you again soon for the next

[music] episode. Cheers, guys. Have a

good one.

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Cold fusion. It's new thinking.

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