- NAND flash prices are moving away from short-term cycles towards structural pressure
- TrendForce data shows that inventory movements no longer dictate SSD component costs
- Suppliers are limiting bit production growth through cautious capacity expansion strategies
NAND Flash prices are entering a phase of sustained pressure that mirrors and may exceed recent DRAM market disruptions.
New data from TrendForce suggests that SSD component costs are no longer driven by short-term inventory cycles.
Instead, structural shifts in manufacturing strategy and demand mix are reshaping how NAND Flash is delivered and priced.
Supply strategies limit bit growth
The latest forecast challenges assumptions that NAND prices will normalize as temporary market imbalances fade, especially as demand for enterprise storage continues to grow.
Memory vendors have aligned NAND Flash strategies toward efficiency improvements rather than aggressive capacity expansion.
Production focus has shifted to higher layer counts, QLC adoption and process optimization, limiting production growth in the short term.
Capital expenditure remains conservative despite increasing demand signals, with cleanroom space and production line constraints acting as limiting factors.
These conditions limit how quickly additional NAND supply can reach the market, even as price incentives increase.
Demand patterns across NAND Flash markets remain uneven. AI infrastructure, enterprise servers, and cloud storage platforms continue to absorb large volumes of high-capacity SSDs.
AI stands out as the primary driver behind rising NAND Flash demand, prompting revisions to the industry’s investment outlook.
At the same time, smartphone and notebook shipments face downward revisions as rising memory costs squeeze device margins.
This divergence has amplified seller leverage, allowing stronger segments to influence contract prices while weaker consumer markets provide limited offsetting demand.
However, investment priorities favor advanced production technologies over raw capacity expansion.
DRAM spending emphasizes advanced nodes and HBM-related output, while NAND Flash investment centers on higher-layer architectures and hybrid bonding techniques.
Equipment suppliers remain optimistic about long-term demand, although increasing technical complexity raises barriers to rapid scaling.
As a result, higher expenses do not directly translate into meaningful bit growth.
For these reasons, contract prices are rising sharply, supported by inventory build-up and sustained corporate demand.
These price increases appear to be more durable than temporary due to limited supply growth, reducing the likelihood of price declines after prices reach higher levels.
If AI-related storage requirements continue to expand faster than production output, SSD NAND components may follow pricing similar to recent DRAM trends.
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