Surging AI server demand is reshaping supply and demand across the global memory market. With DRAM prices rising sharply over the past year, the resulting cost pressure is beginning to spill into the automotive industry.
Intel is considering SK Hynix as a potential partner to help operate its delayed Ohio semiconductor project, Semafor reported, after the South Korean memory maker formally denied pursuing an acquisition of the site.
Samsung Electronics is preparing a die-to-wafer hybrid bonding production line with about 50 bonders at its Pyeongtaek campus for next-generation high-bandwidth memory and logic chips, according to The Elec.
Samsung is in talks to invest about EUR1 billion (approx. US$1.14 billion) in French AI startup Mistral as part of a wider fundraising round, the Financial Times reported, citing people familiar with the matter.
Chinese chip designer GigaDevice is investing another CNY500 million (approx. US$73.9 million) into its wholly owned subsidiary to support its DRAM research and industrialization project, continuing a series of capital injections aimed at expanding its memory business.
SK Hynix said in a July 22 disclosure that it had neither pursued nor decided on an acquisition of Intel's under-construction semiconductor site in New Albany, Ohio, denying a JoongAng Ilbo report that the companies were negotiating over the campus.
Rising memory prices and higher costs for other key upstream components are forcing smartphone brands to reduce mid- and low-end models this year, but handset makers said the demand hit may not be as severe as expected. Industry players said global smartphone shipments could still fall in 2026, though the decline may narrow to a single-digit percentage as higher average selling prices lift total sales value.
Samsung Electronics, SK Hynix and Micron Technology are reportedly scaling back or shelving plans to commercialize internally developed Compute Express Link (CXL) controller chips, shifting more controller work to specialist fabless suppliers while continuing to develop CXL-based memory products.
As the AI boom keeps memory shortages running hot, steep price hikes for smartphones in the second half of 2026 are coming into view. Global market researchers have issued increasingly bleak forecasts, warning that "chipflation" could last through 2027 and that surging memory prices are already lifting the cost of consumer devices.
A powerful rally in memory-chip stocks has stalled as investors reconsider whether record spending on AI data centers could eventually push the DRAM market back into oversupply.
