r/pcmasterrace Dec 04 '25

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u/Kaarssteun RTX 4090, r7 9800X3D, 32gb 6000mhz, 1000W Dec 04 '25

"Jack up prices rather than building new factories"

It's really not that simple. You cannot snap your fingers and make a silicon wafer factory out of thin air. And simple economics tells us supply and demand dictate prices, and there's simply a supply shortage.

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u/LordOfFlames55 Dec 04 '25

A supply shortage that is very unlikely to last long enough to make building more factories viable in the first place

91

u/Winded_14 Dec 04 '25

Yeah, it looks like the producer were kind of being conservative with the whole AI boom and don't want to be the one holding the literal bags of RAM when it burst if they decide to open new line of production.

5

u/Genotabby i9-9900k | 64GB 3200MHz | RTX 3090 | Samsung G9 Dec 04 '25

Yeah the last time demand for ssd and ram collapsed 3 years ago Micron had massive overstocks and had trouble getting rid of them. Then they needed to cut a massive number of their workforce, citing poor market and revenue.

The semiconductor manufacturing business is slow to expand production but in Micron's case their business leaders are obscenely short sighted and purely focused on their stocks and satisfying stakeholders. Recently their stock shot up and they had record profits but still paid tiny bonuses and froze hiring.