Micron CEO says memory shortage may persist beyond 2027

Elon Musk echoed concerns over soaring AI infrastructure costs, saying memory chips and AI capacity remain far short of demand as supply constraints continue to strain the semiconductor market.

32d ago

Fact Check

Both components of the claim are directly corroborated by Micron's Q3 FY2026 earnings call. The investing.com transcript summary confirms CEO Sanjay Mehrotra stated supply tightness is expected beyond 2027. Cryptobriefing, the Yahoo Finance transcript, and BlockBeats all confirm Mehrotra forecast that humanoid robots—requiring roughly 10x the memory of L2+ vehicles—would drive a multi-decade memory demand cycle, prolonging market pressure. The sources are consistent with each other and tied to a specific dated earnings event.

Summary

Micron Technology's CEO previously said memory supply remains unable to catch up with demand and that the tight market may persist beyond 2027, with humanoid robots potentially creating a multi-decade memory demand cycle. Adding to those concerns, Elon Musk cited Apple CEO Tim Cook's remark that the cost surge tied to AI data center construction is unlike anything he has seen in more than 40 years, and said it was the biggest price jump Musk has encountered. Musk added that memory chip and AI infrastructure production is severely short of demand and said capacity needs to rise substantially to address the imbalance.

Terms & Concepts

AI infrastructure: The computing, networking, power and chip capacity needed to build and run artificial intelligence systems.
memory chips: Semiconductor components that store data for computing systems, including AI workloads.
humanoid robots: Human-like robots built to perform physical tasks.