ZOTAC just dropped a warning from Korea that should make every PC gamer sit up straight: graphics card manufacturers might not survive the current memory crisis.
The company posted an alarming message on its official Korean store stating “the current situation is extremely serious, serious enough to raise concerns about the very survival of graphics card manufacturers and distributors going forward.”
This isn’t hyperbole or marketing talk. ZOTAC specifically pointed out that prices for both the RTX 5090 and RTX 5060 have increased sharply, and the company is being forced to cut its rewards points program just to stay afloat.
The culprit? A perfect storm where AI data centers are gobbling up every memory chip available, leaving consumer graphics cards fighting for scraps.
The memory shortage hits different this time
The RAM crisis affecting the tech industry has created a brutal situation where memory now accounts for over 80% of a GPU’s total production cost.
Memory manufacturers like Samsung, SK Hynix, and Micron have pivoted their operations toward producing high-bandwidth memory for AI applications, leaving GDDR6 and GDDR7 modules, the lifeblood of gaming GPUs, in critically short supply.
What makes this particularly nasty is that Nvidia has reportedly prioritized production of cards with less VRAM. Models like the RTX 5070 Ti and RTX 5060 Ti 16GB are becoming harder to find, with retailers reporting they simply can’t order them anymore.
Meanwhile, the RTX 5090 is selling at retailers for $3,500 to $5,000—, double or triple its intended retail price, and several manufacturers have raised prices across their entire lineups starting this quarter.
Why ZOTAC’s warning matters
Unlike massive companies like ASUS, Gigabyte, or MSI that have diverse product portfolios to fall back on, ZOTAC specializes almost exclusively in graphics cards, mini PCs, and a small range of industrial workstations.
When memory prices skyrocket and supply dries up, companies like ZOTAC feel the pain immediately. The Korean statement confirms what many suspected: smaller GPU manufacturers are genuinely at risk of being wiped out.
This echoes EVGA’s exit from the graphics card business a few years back, citing razor-thin profit margins. If the memory shortage persists, and experts are predicting it could last until late 2027 or early 2028, we might see more consolidation in the GPU market, leaving gamers with fewer options and higher prices.
ZOTAC’s warning about “stable supply going forward may no longer be feasible” suggests the worst could still be ahead.
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