According to a report on October 15th, John Vinh, an analyst at US investment bank KeyBanc, pointed out in his latest research on the Asian semiconductor supply chain that the continued expansion of AI data centers is exacerbating the global shortage of memory chips, driving the industry into a new boom cycle supported by long-term supply agreements.
KeyBanc predicts that DRAM prices will rise 15% to 20% quarter-on-quarter in the fourth quarter of 2026, NAND prices will rise by about 20%, and HBM prices may rise by 80% to 100% in the first quarter of 2027. As memory manufacturers continue to shift advanced capacity to AI data centers, the supply of memory chips for PCs and smartphones is expected to decrease by 20% to 30% in bits by 2027.
More noteworthy is the change in customer purchasing behavior. KeyBanc stated that HP and Dell are extending their memory supply agreements to 2031, while Google is discussing extending its agreements to 2035. This means that large technology companies are locking in capacity through long-term procurement arrangements to cope with the uncertainty of future AI infrastructure construction.
This trend is also partially corroborated by research from TrendForce. The agency projects that general DRAM contract prices will rise 10% to 15% quarter-over-quarter in the fourth quarter, while NAND will rise 15% to 20%. Enterprise-grade SSDs, driven by AI inference demand, are expected to see a 23% to 28% increase. Market focus is shifting from short-term storage price increases to whether AI capital expenditures can improve storage vendors' profitability visibility through long-term supply agreements.
