Storage shortage is urgent OpenAI! Altman went to South Korea to secretly meet with 50 Samsung executives: locking in the supply of "Stargate" chips

Kuai Technology reported on October 31 that against the backdrop of the increasing global shortage of memory chip supply, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman held talks with about 50 executives of Samsung Group in Yongin, South Korea on the afternoon of October 31. This is Altman's second visit to Samsung after nearly a year, and the core topic is directly related to memory chip supply and AI infrastructure cooperation. According to a statement released by Samsung, the meeting was held at the Samsung Human Resources Development Center in Yongin City. Participants included Samsung Electronics DS Business Unit Head Jeon Young-hyun, DX Business Unit Head Roh Tae-moon and other core executives. The theme of the meeting is "AI will change the next ten years: Enterprise choices", but the supply guarantee of memory chips is obviously the most pressing practical issue in this meeting. The root cause of the shortage of memory chips lies in the explosive growth of AI demand. The five leading companies in the field of AI infrastructure plan to invest more than US$3 trillion (Quick Technology Note: approximately RMB 21.3 trillion) in the next few years, and memory chip spending accounts for about one-third of the total data center spending. Market research firm SemiAnalysis's calculations are even more radical: the proportion of memory expenditures in the capital expenditures of hyperscale cloud vendors has jumped from about 8% from 2023 to 2024 to about 30% in 2026. The imbalance between supply and demand is directly reflected in prices. TrendForce data shows that in the fourth quarter of 2026, general DRAM contract prices are expected to increase by 10% to 15% month-on-month, and NAND Flash prices will increase by 15% to 20%. The cumulative increase in 2026 is expected to reach approximately 270%. Altman's trip is a continuation of previous cooperation plans between the two parties. According to the announced cooperation arrangement, Samsung will supply memory chips for OpenAI’s “Stargate” infrastructure project, and the two parties will also jointly build AI data centers, including offshore floating data centers. At a time when South Korea's advanced storage capacity has been deeply tied to the demand for AI computing power, Altman personally went to South Korea for interviews, which means that the storage supply of "Stargate" is moving from the intention stage to the substantial lock-in stage.