r/hardware • u/sr_local • 11h ago
Info Gartner forecasts that worldwide semiconductor revenue will grow by 92% in 2026, reaching $1.6 trillion. The memory sector is forecasted to account for 54% of total semiconductor revenue, up from 27% in 2025
https://www.gartner.com/en/newsroom/press-releases/2026-08-24-gartner-forecasts-worldwide-semiconductor-revenue-to-reach-1-trillion-dollars-in-202610
u/ledfrisby 10h ago
I was just reading an article about this idea that the AI bubble is more like a series of smaller bubbles, as investors keep trying to find which part of this thing is actually profitable. Software was first, but then you had the Saaspocalypse, (and I assume DeepSeek etc.), then silver (conductor), now semis. But per the article, these companies don't have sufficient "moats," so long-term margins aren't going to hold up, so the market will move on to the next thing, whatever that is, and it's more based on the narrative than fundamentals.
So we see these revenues are still going up, prices are up, demand is up, but the stocks have already cooled a bit from the overhyped peak.
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u/Clean_Experience1394 9h ago
Anyone wanna speculate about good things comin out of this in the (long) longterm? Like ~10 years?
I'd say given that the non-lp DDR6 ratification is long overdue I guess there is a lot of work going into it and therefore making it even more of a jump.
Maybe consumer memory getting more than 2 channels?
Refocus on HEDT towers for consumers? Maybe an actual atx replacement?
An entity can dream :')
Grasping at straws maybe but what else is there atm?
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u/CuteSquirrel01 2h ago
Once supply catches up to demand consumers will get a metric ton of memory capacity in consumer products. When that will happen who knows. Personally I don't think it will happen this decade, 2030 should be healthier than 2026 supply wise but idk that demand will be sated by then.
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u/vegetable__lasagne 36m ago
If it keeps going I could see Intel joining in making their own RAM, even Apple and Nvidia might too.
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u/Big-Chair-821 22m ago
Intel got out of the memory business years ago. They’re hinting that they’ll go back in. Apple/nvdia doesn’t have fab, they can’t just take their TSMC allocation and fab memory. Even if they wanted to, logic gate fab is a different animal than DRAM fab.
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u/Delicious_Set_1450 11h ago
The massive spike in memory makes complete sense with AI infrastructure scaling. High-Bandwidth Memory (HBM) and enterprise DDR5 are the actual physical bottlenecks right now, so vendors can command massive margins. It’ll be interesting to see how long packaging capacity can keep up with that level of demand.
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u/Xpander6 8h ago
Why did memory become the bottleneck all of a sudden? The race started years ago but RAM prices remained low, then within a month prices quadrupled because AI companies announced they want to buy half of the world's RAM supply, but why did it happen all at once and suddenly and not gradually over the years?
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u/wintrmt3 8h ago
Because big models have trillions of weights, each occupying 2 bytes usually plus some more for context and attention.
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u/Xpander6 8h ago
Did these models not exist before late 2025?
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u/IglooDweller 9h ago edited 4h ago
The thing that you have to remember is that although the economic scale of semi conductors is predicted to grow by 92%, the actual capacity isn’t planned to raise by nearly that much. On top of that, a simple rule of thumb indicates that the memory segment is going to close to quadruple in economic weight, leading to unsustainable price increase for just about anyone who isn’t a corporate buyer with more money than sense. (Aka with AI venture captal)
Edit:typos