Micron Technology commits $10 billion to AI memory research lab as demand surges 50%

Micron unveils $10 billion AI memory research lab in Boise

Aug 20 (Reuters) - Micron Technology (MU.O), opens new tab said on Thursday it plans to spend $10 billion on its newly established research lab at Boise, Idaho, over the next decade to advance memory technologies, develop compute systems and support future chip manufacturing. Large memory chipmakers such as Micron, Samsung Electronics (005930.KS), opens new tab and SK Hynix (000660.KS), opens new tab have been benefiting from a surge in demand from the rapid expansion ⁠of AI infrastructure. Here are some details: Reporting by Jaspreet Singh in Bengaluru; Editing by Shilpi Majumdar Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles., opens new tab

Micron is spending $10bn on a memory research lab

Micron has announced a $10bn research lab in Boise on a ten-year horizon, and its chief executive spent the same day arguing that AI has made memory demand durable. Its shares fell 29% in July, their worst month since 2002. Micron is putting $10bn into a research lab built on the premise that AI has permanently changed what memory is worth. The company announced Micron Research Labs on Thursday, headquartered in Boise, Idaho, with a planned $10bn over the next decade. It is separate from the more than $250bn Micron has committed to American manufacturing and research, and the company calls it the first dedicated memory research hub of its kind in the United States. What the lab is meant to do The research areas are memory technologies, memory and compute architectures, packaging and future semiconductor manufacturing. Micron says the work will look beyond a ten-year horizon. The money funds a flagship Boise campus, university collaborations, satellite labs and partnerships across the industry. The lab connects to Micron research sites in the United States, Europe, Japan, India, Singapore and Taiwan. Micron expects to break ground in 2027 on a facility able to host hundreds of researchers. The company holds 62,000 lifetime patents. "Micron Research Labs gives that legacy a dedicated home for long-horizon innovation, the kind of research that sits upstream of every product we build," said Scott DeBoer, the company's chief technology and products officer. The argument behind the spending Sanjay Mehrotra made the case on CNBC the same day. "Today there is no AI without memory. AI systems need more memory. They need higher performance memory. They need lower power memory," the chief executive told Jim Cramer. "So, the value of memory, that equation has totally changed." He put it more bluntly elsewhere in the interview. "Memory is no longer the component in a system. Memory is the strategic infrastructure for AI." Memory has always been cyclical. Strong demand pulls in new capacity, the capacity arrives late, supply overshoots and prices collapse. CNBC reported that Mehrotra argues AI is creating a more durable source of demand than the industry has seen before. He also said the buying has changed shape. Customers used to solicit bids and take the lowest price. Now memory is designed alongside the processors it will sit next to, which brings Micron into the customer's development cycle earlier. The demand figures he gave Mehrotra said Micron cannot make enough. "All our customers across our end markets will buy everything that we make," he said, adding that data centre customers want roughly 50% more supply than the company can commit to. The company is also locking that demand down. At its late-June earnings call Micron said it had signed five-year strategic agreements with 16 customers, and Mehrotra said more have been signed since. "They have committed to taking the supply," he said. "So, this gives us assurance of demand." Ten endorsements in one press release The announcement arrived with an unusually long list of supporting quotes. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick and Michael Kratsios, who directs the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, both supplied statements framing the lab as an achievement of the current administration. Kratsios described it as accelerating "the AI-driven Golden Age of American Innovation". Jensen Huang and Tim Cook also contributed quotes, as did the chief executives of Applied Materials and Lam Research, the president of the National Academy of Engineering, the chairman of imec, and the presidents of Stanford and the University of Texas at Austin. Micron has been granted up to $6.2bn in CHIPS Act funding, awarded under the Biden administration. What the changed equation looks like elsewhere The desk has spent three months reporting the other end of Mehrotra's value equation. High-bandwidth memory is built by stacking DRAM, and DRAM was 76% of Micron's revenue last quarter. As AI absorbs that supply, prices have risen across everything else that uses it. The shortage reached DDR2, a standard from 2003, which saw 60% price rises. T-Mobile started letting customers pay off handsets more slowly because phones got more expensive. Micron's own margins show the same thing from the profitable side. Its revenue quadrupled last quarter and gross margins passed 81%. The cycle argument has evidence against it Micron shares fell 29% in July, the worst month since 2002. They are up 14% in August. The company disbanded its consumer Crucial brand last year to concentrate on data centre memory. The stock is still up roughly 670% over the past year, ahead of SK Hynix at about 470% and Samsung at over 250%, and Micron passed a $1 trillion market value this year. TNW reported in June when it briefly overtook Meta and Tesla. Micron is not the only one building. SK Hynix is spending $720bn on memory fabs in Korea, and Samsung is building too. All three top HBM suppliers are adding capacity at once, which is how the previous cycles started. CNBC found someone in Boise who has watched this before. Dave Petso, a wealth manager there since the 1980s, told the network that Micron shares rose more than 50% in 1999 after almost doubling the year before, then lost three quarters of their value over the following three years. "You guys are killing it out there, but I've been around a long time," Petso said of the conversations he is having with clients now. "You were killing it in 1999 too." What is not settled Nothing has been built. Ground breaks in 2027, and Micron has not said how many people the lab will employ or what the first projects are. The $10bn is described as planned. Micron's own release carries a forward-looking statements warning saying actual results could differ materially. Mehrotra did not say the cycle is over. He said the value equation has changed and that demand is more durable, which is a narrower claim than the one some coverage has attached to him. The 50% supply gap and the 16 customer agreements are Micron's figures, given by its chief executive on television, with no independent verification.

Micron's new $10 billion lab targets memory beyond today's chips

Micron Technology plans to invest $10 billion over the next decade to establish a new US research hub focused on developing memory and computing technologies beyond today's semiconductor roadmaps. The Micron Research Labs will be headquartered in Boise, Idaho, with a flagship campus designed to host hundreds of researchers. The company expects to break ground on the facility in 2027. The research will focus on critical memory technologies, advanced memory and computing architectures, chip packaging and future semiconductor manufacturing. Micron also plans to fund university partnerships, satellite laboratories and collaborations across the semiconductor industry. The company says the goal is to look beyond the next generation of chips and tackle technologies that could shape computing decades from now. That long-term approach is increasingly important as AI systems demand more memory capacity, bandwidth and energy efficiency. AI workloads are placing growing demands on memory because processors need to move huge amounts of data quickly. Improving memory technologies could therefore become as important as making computing hardware faster. Micron says its new research centre will bring together researchers from industry, universities and government to work on problems that may sit years away from commercial products. "The decisions we make today will determine who leads the AI economy of tomorrow, and America's AI future will be built on American-made memory," said Sanjay Mehrotra, chairman, president and CEO of Micron Technology. The company already has a large US manufacturing and R&D footprint planned. It says the separate commitment totals more than $250 billion and is expected to create more than 90,000 American jobs. Micron Research Labs is intended to complement those manufacturing investments by focusing on fundamental research rather than near-term products. The company says its global research network spans the US, Europe, Japan, India, Singapore and Taiwan. Micron is also positioning the lab as a way to strengthen the pipeline of semiconductor researchers and engineers. The company says it has accumulated 62,000 lifetime patents and wants the new institution to support research that can eventually move from scientific discovery into commercial technology. The research will not be limited to memory devices themselves. Micron says the program will examine how memory interacts with processors, packaging technologies, materials and semiconductor manufacturing processes. That broader focus reflects how modern computing systems are increasingly designed as interconnected hardware rather than isolated chips. Improvements in one part of the system can be limited if other components cannot keep pace. NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang described the challenge as "reinventing memory technologies and architectures to fuel the next generation of increasingly powerful AI systems." Applied Materials CEO Gary Dickerson similarly pointed to advances in "new materials, equipment, process technology and chip packaging" as important to turning research breakthroughs into practical technology. Micron expects the Boise facility to host research conferences, workshops and innovation forums alongside its laboratory work. The company also plans to work with universities and other research organizations on projects that may take years to reach commercialization. The move gives memory research a dedicated US hub at a time when governments and semiconductor companies are increasingly focused on domestic chip capabilities. For Micron, the $10 billion investment is aimed at ensuring the memory technology needed for future computing is developed well before those systems reach the market.

Micron CEO Sanjay Mehrotra says AI has changed memory demand

Micron $MU Technology Chairman, President, and CEO Sanjay Mehrotra said Thursday that artificial intelligence has upended the economics of the memory business, a sector that has historically lurched between periods of shortage and oversupply. "Today there is no AI without memory. AI systems need more memory. They need higher performance memory. They need lower power memory," Mehrotra told CNBC on "Mad Money." "So, the value of memory, that equation has totally changed." Mehrotra said AI is generating a more durable source of demand than anything the memory industry has seen before, according to CNBC. He pointed to autonomous vehicles, robots, and consumer devices with embedded AI as categories that will consume substantially more memory over the coming years. He added that Micron still cannot produce enough to satisfy current demand. "All our customers across our end markets will buy everything that we make," he said, adding that data-center customers currently want roughly 50% more supply than Micron is able to commit. The nature of customer relationships is also shifting. Customers are no longer treating memory as a commodity to be purchased from whoever bids lowest; instead, Mehrotra said they are bringing Micron into product planning far earlier, because memory choices now shape what the finished system can do. As of the company's late-June earnings call, Micron had already secured five-year strategic agreements with 16 customers, a number Mehrotra said has continued to climb. "They have committed to taking the supply," he said. "So, this gives us assurance of demand." Mehrotra's comments came the same day Micron unveiled Micron Research Labs, a U.S.-based research institution in Boise backed by a planned $10 billion investment over the next decade. The lab is designed to bring together academic institutions, government agencies, startups, and the broader semiconductor industry to pursue advances in memory technologies, compute architectures, packaging, and semiconductor manufacturing. Micron said it plans to break ground on the Boise facility in 2027, with the campus designed to host hundreds of researchers. Micron described the new $10 billion commitment as separate from its previously announced plan to invest more than $250 billion in U.S. manufacturing and research and development, a figure the company raised by roughly $50 billion earlier this summer alongside the first concrete pour at its new fab near Syracuse, New York. That facility is expected to become the largest semiconductor manufacturing site in U.S. history, the company said. Construction is also underway on two fabs in Boise, with first wafer output from the first expected in mid-2027. Mehrotra said a single Boise fab will require enough steel rebar to circle Earth twice. "Memory today is essential," Mehrotra said. "That's why I call it the strategic infrastructure of the AI era."

Micron launches $10 billion AI memory research lab in Boise

The planned decade-long investment will fund a flagship Boise campus, university partnerships, and satellite labs worldwide Micron $MU Technology unveiled Micron Research Labs on Thursday, a U.S.-based research institution headquartered in Boise backed by a planned $10 billion investment over the next decade. According to the company, the lab is designed to unite customers, academic institutions, government agencies, and the wider semiconductor industry in pursuit of advances in memory technologies, compute architectures, packaging, and semiconductor manufacturing. Micron describes Micron Research Labs as the first dedicated memory research hub of its kind in the United States. Research will be anchored at a flagship Boise campus, with funding also directed toward university collaborations, global satellite labs, and ecosystem partnerships. The company said it plans to begin construction on the Boise facility in 2027, with the finished campus designed to accommodate hundreds of researchers. "The decisions we make today will determine who leads the AI economy of tomorrow, and America's AI future will be built on American-made memory," Micron Chairman, President, and CEO Sanjay Mehrotra said in a statement. "With a planned $10 billion investment in Micron Research Labs, we are looking around the corner to the memory and compute systems the future will demand." NVIDIA founder and CEO Jensen Huang, Apple $AAPL CEO Tim Cook, Applied Materials $AMAT President and CEO Gary Dickerson, and Lam Research $LRCX President and CEO Tim Archer all issued statements in support of the initiative, as did Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick and White House Office of Science and Technology Policy Director Michael Kratsios. Micron said the new investment is separate from its previously announced commitment to spend more than $250 billion on manufacturing and research and development across the United States, a plan the company said will support more than 90,000 American jobs. Micron describes itself as the only U.S.-based company developing and manufacturing leading-edge memory. Micron raised that broader U.S. investment figure to more than $250 billion earlier this summer, a roughly $50 billion increase from its prior commitment. That announcement came alongside the first concrete pour at Micron's new fab near Syracuse, New York, which is expected to become the largest semiconductor manufacturing site in U.S. history. The company also has two fabs under construction in Boise, with first wafer output from the first of those expected in mid-2027. High-bandwidth memory, the chip type that supplies data to AI accelerators, has surged in strategic importance as AI infrastructure spending accelerates, according to Reuters. The administration has prioritized domestic chip manufacturing as part of its broader push to reduce foreign dependence and maintain a lead in artificial intelligence, according to Reuters.

Micron Unveils $10 Billion Research Labs To Advance Memory and AI - Micron Technology (NASDAQ:MU)

Micron Technology, Inc. (NASDAQ:MU) on Thursday disclosed the launch of Micron Research Labs, a U.S.-based long-horizon research institution aimed at advancing memory and AI technologies. Launches Micron Research Labs For Memory And AI This is supported by a planned $10 billion investment over the next 10 years. Positioned as the first dedicated memory research hub of its kind in the U.S., Micron Research Labs will be anchored by a flagship campus in Boise designed to advance research across critical technology areas. The new research hub will focus on critical memory technologies, advanced memory and computing architectures, packaging and future semiconductor manufacturing. The planned investment will also support extensive collaborations with universities, global satellite laboratories and deeper partnerships across the semiconductor ecosystem, establishing a connected research network focused on technologies beyond the next generation for the AI era. Micron expects to begin construction of its advanced Micron Research Labs facility in 2027, with space for hundreds of researchers. Micron Chairman, President and CEO Sanjay Mehrotra noted that this builds on more than $250 billion already committed to U.S. manufacturing and R&D, reflecting Micron's confidence in AI's long-term potential. Tech SK Hynix vs. Micron: One AI Memory Leader Is Trading at Half the Multiple SK Hynix trades at roughly half Micron's trailing valuation. Here's why investors are watching the surprising gap. 3 min read Read this article Micron (MU) Technical Outlook: Key Levels And Momentum Currently, Micron's stock price stands at $923.00, which is approximately 3.8% above its 20-day simple moving average (SMA) of $894.74 but 3.5% below its 50-day SMA of $962.32. The Relative Strength Index (RSI) is at 51.90, indicating a neutral momentum phase, suggesting that the stock is neither overbought nor oversold at this time. Latest Private Market Opportunities Join 400,000+ Investors The stock is also significantly above its 200-day SMA of $563.69, reflecting a strong long-term trend. However, the 20-day SMA is below the 50-day SMA, which is generally considered a bearish signal. * Key Resistance: $1012.00 -- a nearby level where rebounds can stall, tied to a recent pivot zone. * Key Support: $891.50 -- a nearby level where buyers previously stepped in, aligning with the 52-week low zone. Micron (MU) Earnings Preview And Analyst Estimates Micron Technology is slated to provide its next financial update on September 22, 2026 (estimated). * EPS Estimate: 31 cents (Up from 3 cents YoY) * Revenue Estimate: $50.81 Billion (Up from $11.31 Billion YoY) * Valuation: P/E of 21.2x (Indicates fair valuation) Analyst Consensus & Recent Actions: The stock carries a Buy rating with an average price forecast of $1537.50. Recent analyst moves include: * Citigroup: Buy (Lowers Target to $1150.00) (Aug. 7) * Keybanc: Overweight (Raises Target to $1750.00) (July 14) * Cantor Fitzgerald: Overweight (Raises Target to $2000.00) (June 29) Top ETFs Holding Micron (MU) Stock * Invesco PHLX Semiconductor ETF (NASDAQ:SOXQ): 8.91% Weight * State Street SPDR NYSE Technology ETF (NYSE:XNTK): 8.14% Weight * Invesco AI and Next Gen Software ETF (NYSE:IGPT): 8.71% Weight Significance: Because MU carries such a heavy weight in these funds, any significant inflows or outflows for these ETFs will likely force automatic buying or selling of the stock. MU Price Action: Micron Technology shares were up 0.60% at $942.47 at the time of publication on Thursday, according to Benzinga Pro data. Photo via Shutterstock This content was partially produced with the help of AI tools and was reviewed and published by Benzinga editors. Market News and Data brought to you by Benzinga APIs To add Benzinga News as your preferred source on Google, click here.

Micron CEO Details $10 Billion AI Memory Research Bet

Micron Technologies (MU) CEO Sanjay Mehrotra has already given investors plenty to think about in 2026. Now he's asking investors to look beyond the current memory boom, backing a sprawling $10 billion investment to push the envelope on technologies that go well beyond anything on its existing roadmap. Micron's arguably been the pick of the AI trades this year, with the memory-chip maker's stock more than tripling this year, putting it in rarified air even after a choppy summer. Despite weakness of late, Seeking Alpha data show Micron stock has risen 33% over the past three months and 128% over the past six. Also read: History of Micron: The story behind the computer memory giant Its illustrious run has everything to do with surging demand for high-bandwidth memory and growing confidence that the relentless AI spending isn't slowing anytime soon. Now Micron's putting a massive number behind that optimism, unveiling plans to invest $10 billion over the next decade in Micron Research Labs. Speaking with CNBC's veteran analyst Jim Cramer from Micron's headquarters, Mehrotra linked that enormous $10 billion commitment to a far bigger claim about where memory now sits within the AI boom and why its old role may no longer fit. Why Micron is looking past today's memory cycle Mehrotra's broader message to investors is that Micron isn't treating memory as essentially a supporting act in the AI buildout. "Memory is strategic infrastructure of AI," the Micron CEO told Cramer, arguing that smarter, quicker AI entails a ton of high-performance, lower-power memory. According to him, memory is "no longer a commodity", and without it, AI cannot scale. That said, the sheer scale and scope of Micron's latest commitment lend it greater weight. Micron is planning to invest $10 billion over the next decade in Micron Research Labs, which is a long-horizon research institution headquartered in Boise. Interestingly, the work will stretch beyond today's product roadmaps into critical memory technologies, advanced memory, compute architectures, packaging, and future chip manufacturing. Additionally, Micron is planning university collaborations, global satellite labs, and major ecosystem partnerships, with a flagship Boise facility likely to break ground in 2027 and host hundreds of researchers. With a 10-year horizon. Mehrotra described the strategy as "looking around the corner" to the memory and compute systems future AI will need. For investors, that's a clear message that Micron's looking to be proactive in influencing what comes beyond the current HBM cycle. Over the long-term, that might position the company further upstream in the AI stack, while giving it earlier exposure to emerging technologies and tighter links with customers, universities, and chip-industry partners. Naturally, that payoff is far from guaranteed or immediate at this point, but Micron is spending heavily today to redefine what AI hardware will need next. Why Micron can't afford to fall behind Micron's $10 billion research push also has a defensive angle, given that its biggest memory rivals are generating a ton of cash and aren't standing still. SK Hynix remains the company Micron needs to chase in HBM. According to Counterpoint Research data, SK Hynix accounted for 58% of HBM sales in Q1, while Micron and Samsung each accounted for 21%. Naturally, that lead translates into massive earnings power. SK Hynix reported Q2 sales of 79.3 trillion won and operating profit of 60.5 trillion won, up 257% and 557% from a year earlier. At the same time, SK Hynix is reinvesting aggressively. Reuters reported that the company is looking to raise 2026 capital spending to the high-40-trillion-won range, up from 30.2 trillion won last year. On top of that, it is in talks with nearly 10 long-term customers on agreements lasting five years, giving it stronger visibility into future AI memory demand. Moreover, Samsung might be the more immediate technological threat. A recent TrendForce report showed that Samsung became the first supplier to complete HBM4 validation and begin shipments in Q2, while Micron remained more focused on HBM3E. Moreover, Samsung has shipped what it calls the industry's first HBM4E samples to major customers. Looking at the numbers, its semiconductor division generated 127.5 trillion won in Q2 sales and 89.2 trillion won in operating profit. Also, the broader DRAM market remains tough, too. TrendForce data cited by Biggo put Samsung's Q1 sales at 38.5%, SK Hynix's at 28.8%, and Micron's at 22.4%. For Micron, that makes its enormous $10 billion commitment look less optional, as its rivals already have incredible scale, customer relationships, and enormous cash flows to fund the next generation. Micron stock looks cheap, but there's a catch For Micron investors, the valuation picture seems strangely split. The stock has already delivered tremendous gains, but earnings-based multiples suggest Wall Street expects bottom-line strength to improve much more quickly than the share price. Seeking Alpha data shows Micron trading at 13.27 times forward non-GAAP earnings, around 42% below the sector median of 22.86. Moreover, its forward GAAP P/E of 13.42 is even further behind the sector's 29.77 multiple. Those numbers make Micron look relatively cheap if today's AI earnings surge continues to prove durable. However, other metrics convince investors not to confuse a low PE with an outright cheap stock. Micron trades at around 8.5 times forward sales, about 150% above the sector median. Moreover, its trailing price-to-cash-flow sits 27% above Micron's historical norm. Nevertheless, Wall Street remains bullish. Seeking Alpha's Wall Street consensus shows an average price target of $1,515.11, implying 55.5% upside, although the range from $361 to $2,200 underscores how widely views still differ. The $10 billion research commitment in particular could strengthen the case long-term, but it also raises the stakes: Micron must continue to convert today's spending and AI demand into sustained margins. Further evidence of that, along with support from the broader market, could push the stock's next leg higher. More On Micron Stock: The Arena Media Brands, LLC THESTREET is a registered trademark of TheStreet, Inc. This story was originally published August 21, 2026 at 3:07 PM.

Micron unveils $10 billion AI memory research lab in Boise

Aug 20 (Reuters) - Micron Technology said on Thursday it plans to spend $10 billion on its newly established research lab at Boise, Idaho, over the next decade to advance memory technologies, develop compute systems and support future chip manufacturing. Large memory chipmakers such as Micron, Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix have been benefiting from a surge in demand from the rapid expansion of AI infrastructure. Here are some details: o Micron Research Labs will bring together customers, academia, government and the broader semiconductor ecosystem to pursue breakthroughs, the company said. o The latest investment builds on the more than $250 billion that Micron had separately committed to manufacturing and R&D across the United States. o The lab will be connected to Micron's research and technology footprint across the U.S., Europe, Japan, India, Singapore and Taiwan. o Growing adoption of AI workloads and infrastructure buildout have boosted demand for high-bandwidth memory, which rapidly feeds data to AI accelerators, making it a critical component of modern computing infrastructure. o The Trump administration has prioritized domestic chip manufacturing in a bid to reduce foreign dependence, boost the economic output and maintain its lead in the AI race. o Micron expects to break ground on the facility in 2027, which will be capable of hosting hundreds of researchers and facilitating international conferences and workshops. (Reporting by Jaspreet Singh in Bengaluru; Editing by Shilpi Majumdar)