AI is sucking up all the world's memory.

From American Public Media, this is Marketplace Tech.

I'm Megan McCarty Carrino.

No, I don't mean memory in a metaphysical sense, though that could also be argued.

I'm talking RAM and other kinds of memory hardware.

Much like graphics processing units, high bandwidth memory is essential for training and running AI.

It's paired with all those Nvidia chips that have been selling like hotcakes,

and only a small handful of companies in the world make it. Now, the surge in demand from data

centers has created a global shortage for everything else, the PCs and smartphones and other

consumer electronics that also use memory chips. We spoke with Tom Monelli,

vice president of device and consumer research at IDC, International Data Corporation. I asked him how

long this shortage could last. I think one thing that's really important to note is the memory

industry historically has been kind of a boom and bust

industry. The memory vendors, they build more capacity. They get into an oversupply situation.

The industry ramps up to leverage more memory. And then eventually they get in the supply

constraint. And then they start the whole process again.

With the AI boom, it's basically a whole new area that is requiring memory.

And so our best estimate is that this is going to continue to be a problem throughout 2026 and could easily slide into 27, the memory vendors are going to eventually

build out their capacity. But if you're a memory vendor, this is a very good time to be a memory

vendor to sell your product for the most money that they can get. And so, you know, the other thing

that I think is important to note is,

you know, there's a lot of talk about the AI buildout. There's a lot of talk about whether

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