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TL;DR - If you asked someone what should the most valuable company in the world be - if someone said a company which is present in almost all technology, and is one half of powering a new form of intelligence itself.... Wouldn't you agree that it should be the most valuable?
1. There's only 3 companies which make memory - SK Hynix,Samsung and Micron. That's probably well known,but the reason it's IMPORTANT is because memory isn't like software. You cannot disrupt memory as an industry - dozens of companies literally tried since the 1980s and either failed or got bought by Micron. Why? Because making memory is a feat of physics,not a quick software quirk. You need billions of dollars to set up a fab and DECADES of proprietary knowledge. For context - DRAM,the one which is used in everything OTHER than AI - the ''normal'' memory itself only has 3 companies. Now HBM used for AI is THAT, but with exponentially more advanced technology since you're stacking wafers on top of each other with TSVs (through silicon vias). The problem is - each time the heat generation is so high that to make it work itself is a massive achievement, and the ''yield'' - the % of chips that WORK - is not even 100%. One tiny issue on the 7th layer and the entire thing has to be thrown. Despite THAT,Micron has 75% margins,and extraordinary revenue. This isn't an algorithm like Instagram; its the CUTTING EDGE of materials science and physics.
2. 2 competitors - 3D X DRAM and Z angle semiconductors. And guess what? they both use DRAM anyways. There's no magical escape from buying memory.
And they're years away from a PROTOTYPE.
3) AI needs 3 physical things to run. Accelerators (GPUs),Memory and SSDs. SSDs are normal technology - nothing groundbreaking,(and the reason why SanDisk went up so much anyway.)GPU cannot run without memory - it's not a ''nice to have'' -it's literally HALF of running AI. Yet Jensen's rockstar keynotes have convinced people that AI = GPU. And for all of that,NVIDIA's BIGGEST CUSTOMERS are running away from it. Google,Meta,Amazon - TPUs,MTIA,Trainium. OpenAi has an open source CUDA alternative. BOTH THE SOFTWARE AND HARDWARE MOATS are being aggressively overcome to escape the shackles of the leather jacket. And yet NVDA has 5 trillion + in market cap,FIVE TIMES MORE THAN the thing which has a WAY BIGGER MOAT than it,while actively getting replaced. Because google's in house TPU costs 3-4x lesser than the Rubin/Blackwell. And this isn't ''just for them'' - they're planning to sell it commercially. Soon. And even though inference is 2/3rds of AI compute and people might say that ''it's only for inference,not training '' - wrong. Amazon's chip is for both. And this isn't ,clearly isn't,some fascinating technology NVIDIA has a monopoly on because startups like Groq have also come up with accelerators.
4) EVERY accelerator - Google,Amazon,etc. - needs to come to Micron. (Or the other two,which is the same industry,and boosts the broader point.) EVERY humanoid robot needs memory. Every FSD car needs memory. Previously memory was cyclical because it was there in everything we use,but those things were manufactured every year once. So a real risk of oversupply existed. Now? The demand is infinite.
5) Before the whole AI thing,or other than it - Micron is already in your: Iphone,ipad,car,PC,Smart TVs,Laptops,ADAS in cars,Factory automation, oil and gas monitoring, video security, and smart city infrastructure. AND Highly reliable, extreme-condition sensors and communications equipment for DEFENSE. So - get this straight.
the FLOOR of this company is being in everything you use. The BASELINE. And now it's one half of running AI itself - even a neuromorphic chip NEEDS MEMORY to run. But it dosen't need a GPU.
6) I've heard from people in the industry that senior executives are CRYING - not metaphorically - actually cryin in meetings because they're not getting HBM allocated for themselves. These are people at google,meta,etc. - not some randos. It's making people EMOTIONAL. Becase again you literally cannot run this shit without memory.
7) The P/E ratio is extremely cheap,and it's 1/5th of the market cap of the GPU company,despite it having WAY MORE of a monopoly (as part of an oligopoly). The Street is waking up and setting ''1600'' - that's just the floor. And the ''if hyperscalers stop'' - well the entire economy will stop too. Great bear argument.
8) Anthropic DIRECTLY entered into a ''strategic partnership'' with micron. The AI companies,again,are going to the shop directly.
9) Have you ever heard any CEO say ''there's a massive GPU shortage actually'' - for the ''what if they oversupply HBM'' - As tech gets more abundant you'll deploy MORE hbm,not less,because please explain how AI demand ''slows''. Who's slowing this? I would love to know
10) Everyone thinks this is software where you can just 'come in' from a garage and ''disrupt'' it'. That's the trap - you CAN'T. It's forbidden by atoms