So my understanding of the situation is that, Crucial folks had downsized their factory production (see my other comments for reference perhaps) but then AI involvement started demanding chips just at the time their factory production was at their lows.

So now for these AI companies, they got tons of money to burn so they are willing to pay a lot more, so now crucial only have a limited supply of ram and the thing is there isn't much difference between AI chip and consumer chip but the margins of AI chip are super higher compared to consumer chip

So earlier they would sell consumer chips and AI chips as well but then the AI companies still demanded even more and they would get insane profits selling them so what they did (atleast crucial) is that they stopped selling consumer chips just to sell AI chips for profit.

> I suppose they do not intend to bring a new AI focused unit because it is not worth it or they believe the hype might be gone before it they are done. But what intrigues me is why they would allow other competitors to step up in a segment they dominate? They could raise the prices for the consumers if they are not worried about competition...

Well as a consumer, I certainly hope so but I think that these companies did this case because their have been times they were -55% in stock prices and its just cash making money device at this point and there is a monopoly of fabs with just three key players.

So the answer to your question is "money" and "more money" short term. Their stock prices are already up I think and a company really loves short term rising stock prices

> They could raise the prices for the consumers if they are not worried about competition

Well, would you increase the prices 3-4x? Because supposedly thats how much the AI chips from what I've heard are... And due to this, the second hand market itself is selling these at a close-enough mark.

I don't know but I hope that new players come in the market, I didn't know that this ram industry was such monopolistic with there being only 3 key players and how that became a chokehold for the whole world economy in a way