Samsung, SK hynix, Micron sued over DRAM price fixing; prices up 700% in four years

Samsung, SK hynix, and Micron were sued June 25 in a California federal court by 17 plaintiffs (14 individuals and 3 small PC repair businesses) alleging illegal coordination to restrict DRAM supply and inflate prices. The complaint, filed under Sherman Act Section 1, targets companies that hold roughly 90% of the global DRAM market and claims prices have risen 700% over four years.

The lawsuit alleges the three companies used a coordinated shift toward high-bandwidth memory (HBM) — the stacked DRAM feeding AI accelerators — as a cover to curtail production of older, commodity DDR3 and DDR4 modules. This reduction in supply, plaintiffs argue, artificially drove prices to record highs while no competitor could enter the market, given that building a new DRAM fab costs tens of billions and takes years.

Samsung and SK hynix have faced price-fixing charges before: SK hynix paid a $185 million fine in 2005 after pleading guilty to criminal collusion. The new complaint cites this pattern and recent Apple iPad and Mac price increases as evidence. Investment bank Jefferies forecasts DRAM prices will rise another 40–50% in Q3 2026 and 30–40% in Q4, with no meaningful relief before 2028.

A similar lawsuit in 2018 was dismissed in 2020; the Ninth Circuit upheld that dismissal in 2022, ruling the trio's conduct was 'more likely explained by lawful, unchoreographed free-market behavior.' This new case leans on the HBM pivot as additional evidence of coordination. The allegations remain unproven and defendants have not yet responded in court.