SK Hynix expects DRAM demand to grow mid-20% in 2027

The Korean chipmaker sees NAND demand rising in the high teens as AI infrastructure keeps squeezing memory supply SK Hynix expects DRAM demand to grow by the mid-20% range in 2027. NAND demand is forecast to climb in the high-teens range over the same year. The driver is artificial intelligence. Data centers built for AI workloads need enormous amounts of memory, and the industry is struggling to make enough of it. The forecast and the shortage behind it A quick primer helps. DRAM is the short-term working memory a computer uses while it runs tasks. NAND is the storage that keeps data after the power goes off, the stuff inside SSDs and phones. Both are now in short supply, and SK Hynix’s leadership is not sugarcoating it. CEO Kwak Noh-jung has said 2027 will bring the worst supply situation the memory industry has faced. He went further. Kwak projected that demand will keep outrunning supply even beyond 2030, despite the expansions chipmakers have planned. The company’s mid-20% DRAM estimate sits at the upper end of a wider set of forecasts. Industry projections put 2027 DRAM bit demand growth somewhere between 19% and 25%, with much of the range clustered in the low-to-mid 20s. Bi...