SK Hynix and Micron hit $1 trillion valuations on AI chip boom

South Korean chipmaker SK Hynix and US-based Micron Technology have joined the exclusive $1 trillion market capitalisation club, driven by surging demand for artificial intelligence hardware. The two companies are among the latest technology firms to reach mega valuations as AI investment accelerates globally.

South Korean memory chipmaker SK Hynix and American semiconductor giant Micron Technology have each crossed the $1 trillion market capitalisation threshold, joining a rapidly expanding club of technology companies with mega valuations fuelled by the global artificial intelligence boom.

The milestone reflects the extraordinary growth in demand for high-bandwidth memory chips, which are essential components in AI data centres and the graphics processing units used to train and run large language models. Both companies are key suppliers to major AI hardware manufacturers, positioning them as direct beneficiaries of the technology sector's most significant spending wave in decades.

AI Demand Drives Valuations

The surge in chip valuations mirrors the broader transformation of the semiconductor industry, which has moved from being a cyclical commodity business to a strategic cornerstone of the global AI infrastructure buildout. Companies that produce the memory and logic chips powering AI workloads have seen investor interest intensify as technology giants pour hundreds of billions of dollars into data centre expansion.

SK Hynix and Micron join an elite group that includes Nvidia, TSMC, and other chipmakers whose valuations have been reshaped by AI. The $1 trillion mark, once the preserve of consumer technology giants such as Apple and Microsoft, is increasingly being reached by hardware suppliers whose products sit at the physical foundation of the AI revolution.