Sam Altman meets about 50 Samsung executives as HBM supply sells out

Sam Altman met roughly 50 Samsung executives, including its chip chief, in Yongin. The meeting was aimed at securing more AI memory. It ended without a new supply deal being announced.

The backdrop is a severe shortage of high-bandwidth memory (HBM):

- Samsung's 2027 HBM output is sold out.

- SK Hynix is booked through 2029.

HBM sits next to every accelerator, so memory rather than GPUs is now a gating factor for buildouts like OpenAI's.

The squeeze reaches inside Samsung. Its device (DX) division posted a Q3 operating loss amid rising component costs, and union demonstrations at the Suwon campus protested pay disparities with the chip units.

PC builders are hoping for relief anyway: an r/LocalLLaMA thread titled 'Maybe we'll get cheap RAM for Christmas' drew 2,125 upvotes.