- Lawsuit Claims RAM Suppliers Colluded to Fix Memory Prices
- He says they did this by moving manufacturing to higher-priced HBM.
- But I doubt that demand will make memory cheaper for consumers.
Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you probably know that PC component prices are out of control right now. Computer memory costs are some of the hardest hit, making upgrading your PC almost impossible for everyone except the five richest kings in Europe.
Now, it seems that some people feel that there is something deeply suspicious about all these price increases. In fact, a recently filed lawsuit alleges that the world’s leading RAM producers (Samsung, SK Hynix and Micron) colluded to deliberately limit memory supply and, as a result, increase prices.
According to the filing (via AppleInsider), the three named companies moved their manufacturing capacity for DRAM modules such as DDR3 and DDR4, i.e. the type of memory used in phones, computers, tablets and other consumer devices, towards HBM, which is used in artificial intelligence (AI) data centers and sold at a higher price. With less supply, memory prices increased accordingly.
On the face of it, that’s not illegal: companies can make strategic decisions to maximize profits if they want to. But what the lawsuit claims is that this move was a concerted and coordinated decision between the three companies, rather than each responding separately to market conditions.
Because they have a stranglehold on the RAM market (up to 89% of DRAM market share and 100% of HBM market share, according to Counterpoint Research), accusations of coordination, if proven, could amount to illegal behavior, which could include price fixing.
Will this end the RAMpocalypse?
If you’re reading this and are desperate for good news amid all the doom and gloom about PC components, you might be hoping that a favorable ruling in this lawsuit will open the door to lower memory prices and go some way toward bringing costs back to reasonable levels.
Unfortunately, that outcome is unlikely. The lawsuit hasn’t proven anything yet, and proving beyond a doubt that Samsung, SK Hynix, and Micron colluded to screw over consumers (rather than simply making independent decisions in response to the same crisis) will likely be extremely difficult to prove.
But even if the plaintiffs succeed, the lawsuit is likely to be a long, drawn-out process, with many appeals and possible reversals. And even then, it won’t change the reality that right now prices are through the roof. We won’t get any immediate relief, no matter what happens in the courtroom.
That skeptical view is widely reflected on social networks. On Reddit, for example, user HorsePockets noted that HBM memory “pays much more than conventional DRAM and allows [the defendants] transition away from being purely cyclical stocks.” They argued that increasing HBM’s output simply makes sense from a business perspective.
EloquentPinguin, for its part, put it this way: “If they really believe that DDR3 is done away with in favor of HBM, and not because it is an almost 20-year-old technology with two successive generations well established, then they might simply be understanding [at] straws.”
This illustrates how difficult this case could be to prove and how little impact it could have on the current RAM crisis. But the reality is that prices are completely out of control right now, regardless of whether or not memory manufacturers colluded to ensure that happened. Punishing the alleged culprits may seem cathartic, but it won’t correct prices anytime soon. And that is the real injustice here.
Follow TechRadar on Google News and add us as a preferred source to receive news, reviews and opinions from our experts in your feeds.
The best DDR5 RAM for all budgets
