If you have priced a new laptop or desktop recently and had a small shock, there is a reason for it, and it has very little to do with your supplier.
AMD’s latest quarterly results show where the world’s chip capacity is going. Company revenue rose 50 per cent year on year to a record $11.5 billion US, and the data centre business alone made up 58 per cent of that, reaching $6.7 billion US. That is up 107 per cent on the same quarter last year. The demand driving it is artificial intelligence.
The other half of the story is the part that reaches your office. AMD’s gaming revenue fell 31 per cent to $779 million US, and The Verge reports that price rises and component shortages slowed sales of the Xbox Series X and S, the PS5 and Valve’s Steam Deck.
Why a console shortage matters to your business
Those devices use the same kinds of parts as ordinary business machines: processors, graphics silicon and, above all, memory. When AI buyers will pay more for the same supply, everyone further down the queue waits longer and pays more. The scale of that buying is not small. In a separate set of results this week, SpaceX reported capital expenditure of $18.4 billion US in a single quarter as it builds out AI capacity.
What to do about it
- Bring hardware refreshes forward rather than pushing them back. The machine you planned to replace in six months may well cost more then, not less.
- Ask how long a quote stays valid, and expect a shorter window than you are used to.
- Check lead times before you commit, not after. Right now, in stock is worth more than a small discount.
- Do not let an ageing machine become an emergency purchase. Emergencies always pay full price.
None of this is a crisis, and nobody needs to panic-buy laptops. It is a planning problem, and planning problems are cheap to fix early.
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