Rampant AI demand for memory fuels deepening supply crunch for chips

By Debby Wu, Takashi Mochizuki and Yoolim Lee   A growing procession of tech industry leaders including Elon Musk and Tim Cook are warning about a global crisis in the making: A shortage of memory chips is beginning to hammer profits, derail corporate plans and inflate price tags on everything from laptops and smartphones to automobiles and data centers — and the crunch is only going to get worse.   Since the start of 2026, Tesla Inc., Apple Inc. and a dozen other major corporations have signaled that th ...