Overview
- Retail DDR5 prices in Germany have surged to roughly five times their level a year earlier, with industry trackers showing an index near 486% in mid‑August 2026.
- Hyperscale datacenter buyers have reportedly secured large shares of DRAM output for 2027 through advance deals, leaving fewer chips available for consumer memory and forcing buyers to compete for remaining stock.
- Internal SSD prices are also rising and Phison’s CEO said conversations with NAND manufacturers now push expected mass production ramps toward about 2030, extending storage supply pressure for years.
- Higher DRAM and NAND costs are already forcing device makers to raise prices and straining software businesses, with Zoho founder Sridhar Vembu saying the 12‑month memory surge is making it hard to absorb costs without passing them to customers.
- Relief would require multi‑year increases in wafer capacity or a slowdown in AI memory demand because HBM and high‑capacity DRAM use many more wafers than standard chips, creating long lead times for any supply expansion.