Huaqiangbei, home to the world’s biggest electronics wholesale market, is seeing a dramatic increase in the prices of memory chips and other storage products, which is expected to drive up the cost of consumer electronics goods such as smartphones, tablets and personal computers.
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The increase, especially for large-capacity models, has been “astounding”, as some memory chips had doubled in price, said Cai Zhaojie, a vendor who sells and builds personal computers for enterprises and professional users in Huaqiangbei, located in the southern tech hub of Shenzhen.
A 32-gigabyte DDR5 memory kit, which cost around 1,000 yuan (US$140) in September, sold for 1,300 yuan by mid-October when a client of Cai complained about the price increase. That same product now costs 1,799 yuan, according to Cai. These kits are high-speed memory components used in video gaming computers.
DDR5 is a new generation of dynamic random-access memory (DRAM) chip, which functions as high-speed memory in PCs, smartphones and servers.
“Because of this price hike, the number of clients planning to build new computers has decreased,” Cai said. “Some have postponed their purchase or opted for second-hand equipment.”
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Cai said he had to explain to customers that the price increase was out of vendors’ control. “It’s making our business very difficult,” he said.