Samsung lost its DRAM market leadership, which it had held for 33 years, to its rival SK Hynix in the first quarter of 2025. We can say that SK Hynix owes this success to its strong performance in the HBM (High Bandwidth Memory) segment.
SK Hynix took the lead in the DRAM market
According to the report published by Counterpoint Research, the company reached a 36% market share in the first quarter of the year. While Samsung fell to second place with 34%, Micron ranked third with 25%. This picture surprised many people.
SK Hynix left its competitors behind by reaching an overwhelming 70% market share in the HBM field. In particular, the HBM3E memory modules it supplied to Nvidia’s new generation GPUs strengthened the company’s position in the market.
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Samsung, on the other hand, could not be included in Nvidia’s supply chain due to the problems it experienced in HBM memories, which are extremely complex to produce. The company plans to complete its new production process largely in the first half of this year in order to avoid similar problems with HBM4 chips.
This change in the DRAM market means a historic break for the sector. According to analysts, the market will continue to grow at full speed in the second quarter of the year. For this reason, SK Hynix is expected to maintain its leadership for at least another quarter.
Whether Samsung can regain momentum with HBM4 memory will determine how the balances in the DRAM market will shape in the coming periods. So what do you think about this issue? You can easily share your views with us in the comments section below.
