Many consumer electronics manufacturers 'will go bankrupt or exit product lines' by the end of 2026 due to the AI memory crisis, Phison CEO reportedly says

News
By published

This mess is going to get a lot worse before it gets better.

《獨家專訪#群聯 執行長潘健成!# AI 是剛需!市場需求太大#記憶體 大缺貨! 要預付三年現金!》【年代向錢看】2026.02.13@ChenTalkShow #中國 #台積電 #CSP - YouTube 《獨家專訪#群聯 執行長潘健成!# AI 是剛需!市場需求太大#記憶體 大缺貨! 要預付三年現金!》【年代向錢看】2026.02.13@ChenTalkShow #中國 #台積電 #CSP - YouTube
Watch On

Is it just me, or does it feel like everything is just about to spiral out of control with this AI-memory-boom-chatbot-slop-crisis thing? We already know that memory prices have gone bananas and that the crisis is complicating the production of all kinds of computing-adjacent devices. Now the CEO of memory specialist Phison is reported to be claiming that the situation is going to drive some makers of consumer electronics to the wall. Many will go bust by the end of 2026.

In an X post, user 駿HaYaO has précised an interview with Phison CEO Pua Khein-Seng. You can catch the entire interview on YouTube. However, the discussion is in Chinese and there are no English subtitles available.

To that extent, we cannot confirm Khein-Seng words verbatim. However the salient translated summary of what he said according to 駿HaYaO goes like this:

"Consumer electronics will see a large number of failures. From the end of this year to 2026, many system vendors will go bankrupt or exit product lines due to a lack of memory. Mobile phone production will be reduced by 200-250 million units, and PC and TV production will be significantly reduced." Yikes.

Pua Khein-Seng is also said to have pointed out the implications of Nvidia's next-gen Rubin AI GPUs coming online. "If NVIDIA's Vera Rubin ships tens of millions of units, each requiring over 20TB of SSD, it will consume approximately 20% of last year's global NAND production capacity (excluding subsequent data storage)," is how 駿HaYaO summarises Pua Khein-Seng's comments.

Images of Nvidia's Blackwell GPU from GTC.

Nvidia's AI chips have a lot to answer for... (Image credit: Nvidia)

Pua Khein-Seng is further said to have highlighted that memory manufacturers are now "demanding three years' worth of prepayment (unprecedented in the electronics industry)" and that those same manufacturers "internally estimate the shortage will last until 2030, or even for another 10 years."

駿HaYaO concludes with some analysis of Pua Khein-Seng's comments, observing, as we also have, that the outlook for memory production capacity is grim.

"Samsung, Micron, SK Hynix, Kioxia, Yangtze Memory and other companies have invested, but it takes at least 2 years from announcement to production, and the equipment is in high demand. China's contribution is limited: the new capacity will only account for 3-5% of the global total in the initial stage, which is not enough to fill the 10-20% gap; China's domestic demand is huge, so there will be no outflow of cheap goods."

A promotional image for Samsung's 12 nm-class DDR5-DRAM production, showing multiple DRAM modules on a UDIMM circuit board.

(Image credit: Samsung)

駿HaYaO also implies that one of the possible upsides to all this is sustainability. "Product lifespan is extended, and products are repaired instead of being discarded when they break," the X user says.

The slight problem with that idea is that, if anything, production of electronics is increasing. It's just that the ratio of output is shifting away from consumer devices like phones or PCs towards commercial devices like servers and AI GPUs. It would take some serious sophistry to explain how reducing the number of phones or laptops being made and replacing them with 1,400 W Nvidia B300 GPUs was an obvious environmental play, that's for sure.

MSI MPG 321URX gaming monitor
Best gaming monitors 2026

1. Best overall / 4K:
MSI MPG 321URX

2. Best budget 4K:
Asus ROG Strix XG27UCG

3. Best 1440p:
MSI MPG 271QRX

4. Best budget 1440p:
KTC H27T22C-3

5. Best 1080p:
AOC Gaming C27G4ZXE

6. Best Ultrawide:
Gigabyte MO34WQC2

7. Best budget ultrawide:
Xiaomi G34WQi

8. Best 32:9:
Samsung Odyssey OLED G9

9. Best dual-mode:
Alienware AW2725QF


👉Check out our full gaming monitor guide👈

TOPICS
Jeremy Laird
Jeremy Laird
Hardware writer

Jeremy has been writing about technology and PCs since the 90nm Netburst era (Google it!) and enjoys nothing more than a serious dissertation on the finer points of monitor input lag and overshoot followed by a forensic examination of advanced lithography. Or maybe he just likes machines that go “ping!” He also has a thing for tennis and cars.

You must confirm your public display name before commenting

Please logout and then login again, you will then be prompted to enter your display name.