This is something that has been announced repeatedly for a few months: there are no memory chips. This is not a one-time situation or a problem that will be resolved in weeks.
The insatiable demand for artificial intelligence is skyrocketing the consumption of RAM, SSD and other components, to the point that the balance of the entire market is beginning to collapse under its own weight.
The warning now comes from a report cited by The Wall Street Journal: Up to 70% of all memory manufactured in the world in 2026 will go directly to data centers. That is, seven out of ten chips will not end up in mobile phones, computers, cars or TVs, but in huge facilities dedicated to training AI models and processing data tirelessly..
According to his own account Wall Street Journalthe impact will be felt in the automotive sector, consumer electronics and even household appliances. As they compare, the situation is quite similar when there were delays and bottlenecks in the automobile sector during the pandemic.
It doesn’t seem like it, but the absence of RAM becomes a problem for everything
It may seem a bit exaggerated, but almost everything today has memory. Not just computers or cell phones. Also newer cars, televisions, Bluetooth speakers, set-top boxes and even smart refrigerators depend on RAM chips to function.
And therein lies the problem: Although many of these products use older memories, manufacturers have reduced or outright closed production lines for older chips..
The reason is that they are not profitable. Big memory companies are pouring their factories into advanced data center chips, which pay much better. The result is that getting memory for other sectors is becoming an impossible task.
MS Hwang, an analyst at Counterpoint Research, sums it up this way: «Right now you have to get on a plane and go secure that seat directly with the manufacturers.» And he adds one more fact: the production capacity for 2028 is already practically sold.
The direct consequence will be that basic products that everyone takes for granted could become more expensive. Not because they include cutting-edge technology, but because one of their most basic components has become a luxury.
A period that is expected to be quite long
On other occasions, price increases in components have been cyclical. They go up, they go down and the market adjusts. But this time, experts agree that we are not dealing with something temporary.
Hwang estimates that memory could represent up to 10% of the price of many electronic devices and up to 30% of the cost of products such as smartphones..
This can already be seen in the forecasts themselves. IDC has updated its estimate for 2026 with a 5% drop in mobile sales and a 9% drop in PC sales. And he warns that what we are seeing is a «permanent reallocation» of capacity from providers to AI data centers.
The root of the problem is clear: AI requires gigantic amounts of memory to train and function. Each new model, each improvement, requires more chips, more capacity and more investment. Data centers compete with each other to secure supply, and that leaves the rest of the market in the background.
If nothing changes, the consumer will be the one who feels the blow. More expensive cell phones, cars with delays, televisions that increase in price without improving performance. RAM, that component that almost no one talked about, has just become the main protagonist and not exactly for something positive.