The surge in AI demand has led to a squeeze on chip production capacity, resulting in severe shortages and price increases for memory and central processing units (CPUs). Sales of branded notebook and desktop (DT) products have declined, and the PC DIY market is in dire straits. PC supply chain sources revealed that the four major Taiwanese motherboard manufacturers have all lowered their 2026 shipment targets set at the end of 2025, and almost all of them have experienced a "collapse."
The situation is worse than during previous financial crises and the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic. This is not only due to shortages and price increases of the two key components, memory and CPU, but also because of reports that NVIDIA GPU updates and upgrades have slowed down, leading to a significant decrease in gamers' willingness to purchase.
Among them, ASUS is facing its first battle to defend its 10 million motherboard units, while MSI and Gigabyte are confirmed to have fallen below the 10 million unit mark, a year-on-year decrease of about 25%, and ASRock's decline is estimated to exceed 30%.
The shortage of memory and CPUs has directly impacted consumer demand. Multiple shipment forecasts warn that the global PC market, which had just begun to recover, will once again enter a recession in 2026.