Memory and storage company Micron has recently taken to its quarterly earnings report to share “stellar records in revenue, gross margin, earnings per share and free cash flow.” However, supply remains a dark cloud propelling the memory crisis, and it is apparently struggling to keep up with demand.
Sanjay Merhotra, the CEO of Micron, recently spoke to investors, elaborating on issues with supply relative to demand. He said, “We are now seeing NAND demand significantly in excess of our available supply for the foreseeable future.”
“In calendar 2026, a number of factors including DRAM and NAND supply constraints could cause PC and smartphone units to decline in the low double-digit percentage range.’
He elaborated that Micron expects both DRAM and NAND supply to be constrained throughout 2026, and to remain “tight beyond calendar 2026”. Adding to this, Merhotra said Micron is “working to address the unprecedented gap between supply and demand.”
To counter that gap, Micron has acquired a semiconductor facility in Tongluo, Taiwan, which it expects to “support meaningful product shipments” by 2028. Micron also plans on beginning construction of a second cleanroom in that fab in 2027, and Micron’s Idaho fab is expected to yield wafer output by the middle of 2027.
Micron makes it clear to investors that this is not the only place it plans on increasing its revenue going forward. It claims “other parts of the markets are important to us, such as PCs, smartphones, automotive, industrial, and we want to maintain that well-diversified mix for our end markets.”
In the earnings call, Merhotra said that AI growth is continuing to increase the already high demand for memory, and “Customers are working in this tight supply environment to manage the mix of their products”, but that “overall, we are very much working with customers across our end markets.”
In the short-term, Micron is reportedly doing what it can to get its memory into the hands of its customers, and mid to long-term, plans on increasing output of memory through investments. However, we are still years off from the supply actually meeting AI demand, assuming the bubble doesn’t pop and demand fizzles.
