Micron, SK Hynix hit $1trn valuation amid AI chip demand - Silicon Republic

Micron and SK Hynix have both crossed the $1 trillion market valuation threshold amid surging demand for memory chips driven by artificial intelligence (AI). This milestone underscores the critical ro... Read original →

Micron and SK Hynix crossing the $1T valuation mark reflects not just AI-driven memory demand, but a structural leap in DRAM technology. HBM3E—and soon HBM4—now demands EUV-intensive patterning and micron-level TSV stacking, narrowing viable production to Samsung, SK Hynix, and Taiwan, China’s TSMC ecosystem. Geopolitical friction intensifies: U.S. CHIPS Act mandates for onshore capacity, coupled with China’s aggressive scale-up of YMTC and CXMT’s sub-20nm DRAM, force Korean firms into costly supply chain realignments, raising capex by over 15%. Samsung may abandon DRAM price wars to co-package 3nm GAA logic with HBM, locking in hyperscalers like Meta and OpenAI. Meanwhile, NVIDIA’s AI dominance remains bottlenecked by external HBM dependency. Over the next 18 months, HBM capacity—not logic chips—will dictate AI infrastructure velocity; memory players outside CoWoS/InFO integration face irreversible marginalization.