Japan-Korea fight could affect global memory supply

According to the Asian media Nikkei , the new trade limitations established between Japan and South Korea could end up compromising the supply of global memory simply by restricting the export of chemical products.

Now a company that exports a chemical has to ask the Japanese government for permission

As the report says, Japan has limited its export of three vital chemicals (such as orthophosphoric, hydrobromine, and citric acid) used in semiconductor manufacturing to South Korea.

Unlike before, a company that exports a chemical now has to ask the Japanese government for permission to be able to supply semiconductor factories in South Korea.

Visit our guide on the best RAM memory on the market

The end result of this change could be serious damage to the global memory supply, as more than 70% of DRAM and more than 50% of NAND memory is manufactured in South Korea. Government processing of chemical export requests is estimated to take about three months, while memory manufacturers typically have only one to two months of additional manufacturing supply. SK Hynix, the third-largest memory maker by revenue, said that if it doesn't get enough supplies of materials, it would have to stop production. These events could lead to an increase in the price of memory and, in general, to a lower supply.

We will see what happens, but this could generate, once again, an increase in the prices of the memories and those SSD units, when the trend was that these would drop in price throughout the year, especially the latter. We will keep you informed.

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