The consumer tech industry is facing an ongoing storage crisis. Due to increasing demand from enterprise customers (to build AI data centers), storage manufacturers are directing much of their inventory to these customers, leaving little for consumer-oriented product manufacturers.
This has led to an increase in the price (or a reduction in overall storage) of PCs and smartphones. In the near future, memory shortages are expected to affect TVs, tablets, smartwatches, and pretty much any other device that uses RAM.
According to Christopher Moore, VP of Marketing, Mobile and Client Business Unit at Micron, the situation may not ease until 2028 (according to an exclusive interview with wccftech.com).
Micron’s exit from the consumer market signals a strategic shift
In December 2025, Micron closed its consumer-focused Crucial RAM and SSD brand to focus on enterprise and AI markets. This led to a backlash against the company as it showed a clear bias towards the rapidly increasing demands of the AI sector rather than those of the end user.
However, Micron has clarified that a “large portion” of its market share still comes from LPDDR5 RAM modules, which are supplied directly to OEMs such as Dell and ASUS.
Under the OEM model, the company still controls a large portion of the consumer supply chain. “Our position is that we’re trying to help consumers around the world,” Moore says, adding that the company remains connected to “every single” PC maker out there.
The executive explains that the exponential increase in the total addressable market (TAM) for DRAM, driven by increasing demand for AI data centers, is now at 40% (from 30 to 35%). He also mentions that “50 to 60% of the total market needs more bits” than before.
The company continues to serve consumers, but under new conditions
While the increase in demand due to the increase in AI applications and data centers is too significant for the company to ignore (i.e. it needs to address the market as it represents a good business opportunity), the company is “still serving the consumer market.”
Even as the company ramps up production, the memory shortage won’t go away anytime soon, at least not until 2028. Moore confirms that Micron’s massive factory expansion won’t provide significant relief until 2028.
The company is working closely with PC and smartphone manufacturers to limit RAM configurations because multiple memory sizes would impact production yield but would only stabilize supply in the short term. Ultimately, this means one thing: the storage crisis will continue and may continue to worry end users for a few years.
