Samsung Electronics is back in focus as investors bet on its next move in the AI hardware race. Shares jumped as much as 6.4% after a Bloomberg report said the company is preparing to mass-produce a new generation of memory chips designed specifically for artificial intelligence workloads.
The chips in question are HBM4, or high-bandwidth memory, a crucial component inside today’s most powerful AI systems. Samsung is expected to begin large-scale production soon, with shipments to Nvidia potentially starting as early as late February. The memory will be used in Nvidia’s upcoming Vera Rubin AI accelerators, built to handle the growing strain of data-heavy AI models.
This matters because Samsung has been chasing the lead held by domestic rival SK Hynix, which recently became Nvidia’s primary supplier of high-bandwidth memory. Progress on HBM4 suggests Samsung is narrowing that gap, putting it back in contention as a key supplier in the global data-centre buildout.The market response reflects more than a single product update.
Samsung’s shares are now up close to 40% this year, lifted by a sharp rise in memory chip prices across the industry. Demand from hyperscalers such as Amazon and Alphabet has been relentless, with some memory prices nearly doubling since the end of 2025.That demand is being driven by scale.
Four major hyperscalers are expected to spend around $650 billion on data centres this year, a wave of investment that has pushed Nvidia’s shares higher and strengthened confidence across the wider semiconductor supply chain.
