RAM price increase: what AI demand does to IT budgets

RAM price increase arrived in late 2025 as an unexpected variable for Italian SMEs planning IT investment for 2026. In December 2025, DDR5 modules cost up to 200% more than six months earlier, and the pressure extends well beyond gaming and hardware enthusiasts. Approved budgets and operational plans are already being revised.

A pressured oligopoly

The DRAM market is controlled by three companies: Samsung, SK Hynix and Micron. That concentration meets an explosive demand from datacenters built for artificial intelligence. High Bandwidth Memory and RDIMM modules for AI servers are absorbing production capacity that until recently served the consumer and business market. The immediate effect is a sharp fall in supply for non-enterprise segments. Analysis by TrendForce shows that stock held by the main system integrators covers about two months of production. Companies such as Asus and MSI have started buying memory on the spot market, traditionally reserved for small buyers or unexpected demand spikes. The pressure is producing increases of 15% to 25% on DDR4 and DDR5 modules at European resellers.

Why manufacturers hold back capacity

Despite record profits in the third quarter of 2025, Samsung, SK Hynix and Micron are reluctant to invest billions in new plants. The concern is that AI demand may be a bubble that deflates and leaves them with excess capacity. Between 2022 and 2023 the sector went through an overproduction cycle that eroded margins and produced significant losses. To avoid repeating it, manufacturers keep output under control and prioritise short-term profitability over structural expansion. Even with a change of strategy, designing, building and starting a modern semiconductor plant takes between 18 and 36 months. Structural relief cannot materialise before 2027 or 2028.

The impact on small businesses

For a company assessing a machine refresh, a server upgrade or new workstations, the current situation creates operational problems. A quote prepared in September 2025 for workstations with 32GB of DDR5 now costs 40% to 60% more on the memory component alone, which can cancel approved projects or force reduced configurations that compromise expected performance. Delivery times are uncertain: many distributors report limited availability and waiting periods measured in weeks, a risk for companies working on order deadlines. Manufacturers are passing the increase on. Lenovo has announced higher prices for early 2026. Dell reported increases of 15% to 20% from mid-December 2025. HP expects a difficult second half of 2026. Apple, despite stronger contracts with producers, is not immune to the general trend.

Mitigation options

Companies that cannot postpone IT investment have several options to weigh. Accelerating critical purchases locks in current prices if the need is certain and the budget is available, since analysts agree that prices will keep rising through 2026. Reconsidering technical specifications can help: DDR4 modules may be an acceptable compromise for uses that do not need maximum performance, and the price difference frees budget for other components. Hybrid configurations concentrate memory on critical workstations and keep standard machines leaner, which requires an analysis of operational flows but produces substantial savings. Exploring cloud alternatives moves some computing capacity to external infrastructure, with the usual trade-offs around data governance, recurring cost and vendor dependence.

Planning without certainty

The memory crisis is not a short-term phenomenon. Structurally high AI demand, limited production capacity and conservative manufacturer strategies point to high prices and reduced availability at least until 2027. For Italian SMEs, this means adding to IT decisions a variable that a year earlier was considered stable and predictable. The task is not simply to pay more. It is to rethink timing, configurations and priorities in a context where hardware cost becomes a strategic lever rather than a technical expense line. Companies planning IT investment for 2026 should treat the dynamic as the new market normal and structure decisions around delays, unavailability and further price increases.

Those increases land on the operating budget through the hardware cost of an ERP in 2026, which companies rarely choose directly.