Recently, the wave of price increases in the mobile phone market has quietly spread. Red rice, which has always been favored by ordinary consumers for its "extreme cost performance", has also failed to withstand the cost pressure. It is reported that when the Red Rice K90 series was released, the pricing was raised compared with the previous generation. The price difference between the 12+512GB version once caused heated discussions. The Turbo5 series also quietly increased its price by 100 yuan after ending the special memory subsidy. Red Rice executives even bluntly said "It's a pain to carry", admitting that one of the core reasons for the price increase is the soaring cost of upstream memory chips. The price increase of red rice is just a microcosm of the chaos in the civilian storage market. The recent crazy price increases of memory and hard disk are no longer lies that "the explosion of AI demand" can cover up-in essence, they are just a harvest drama carefully designed by several monopoly giants to target ordinary consumers. The so-called "tight production capacity" and "shortage of raw materials" are just a fig leaf they use to rationalize price increases and cover up the nature of profit-seeking. However, ordinary users like us are always leeks that are being manipulated at will from beginning to end.
The script of this harvest was clearly written by the big manufacturers from the beginning. Every step was accurately stepped on the weakness of consumers, and every link was filled with capital's greed and calculations.
The first step is to abandon civilian use and bet on high-end, laying the foundation for price increases. Everyone knows that the profits of AI-specific storage (such as HBM) and enterprise-level storage are several or even ten times that of civilian DDR4 and ordinary NAND. Under the aegis of AI, monopoly giants did not hesitate to allocate most of their advanced production capacity to AI customers who could bring excess profits, and adopted a strategy of "proactively reducing production and deliberately controlling volume" for the civilian market. It's not that they can't make civilian storage, but they don't want to make it at low prices-after all, low-priced civilian products are far less "fragrant" than AI orders. Instead of small profits and quick turnover, it's better to proactively control the quantity and pave the way for subsequent price increases.
The second step is to use AI outlets to collectively raise prices. When production capacity was deliberately compressed, the giants began to complain about it: "AI demand exploded, storage capacity was seriously insufficient" and "raw materials rose in price, and costs remained high." This rhetoric sounds reasonable, but in fact it is full of loopholes-the cost of civilian storage particles has not increased enough to support doubling the price increase. The so-called "cost pressure" is just their excuse. The real purpose is to use AI, a focus of national attention, to earn back the money lost in low-price competition in previous years from the civilian market at one time, or even make a lot of money.
The third step is to deliberately sell it, so that the civilian market "asks to buy". The giants are well aware of the truth that "scarce goods are more expensive". They neither completely run out of stock for civilian storage nor provide sufficient supplies. They always maintain a tense situation of "exceeding supply" and allow prices to soar. Even the old hard drives and old memories a few years ago have also risen due to the rising prices of new products. It is not that these old products have suddenly become valuable, but the inflated prices of new products have provided a foundation for the second-hand market. Dealers and second-hand vendors took the opportunity to hoard and share the dividends of this harvest together, and in the end, ordinary consumers paid the bill.
The most disgusting thing is the fourth step: put in the "cost-effective hit" and collect the last wave of leeks. When consumers in the civilian market are pushed to the end of endurance by rising prices and even begin to refuse to buy, the giants will launch a so-called "affordable product""in a timely manner-such as an entry-level DDR4 memory that claims a" conscience price ", affordable SATA SSD, and hyping up their" user-friendly "and" breaking the price increase deadlock." But as long as you slightly compare the prices before the price increase, you will find that this so-called "cost-effective model" is still a lot more expensive than before the price increase. It is just a little more friendly than the current inflated market, which is enough to make Users who have been tortured by high prices feel "so fragrant", so they obediently took out their wallets and completed the last round of harvesting.
In the final analysis, there is only one root cause of all this chaos: cyclical harvesting under oligopoly. The global memory and hard disk market is firmly controlled by a few giants. Without sufficient market competition, they can control prices and production capacity as they please: when they lose money, they will reduce production together to stabilize prices; when they make money, they will increase prices together, squeeze profits; now with AI as an excellent theme, they are even more unscrupulous, using the civilian market as a "cash machine" for harvesting.
We complain about "unreasonable justice" and "unreasonable", but from the perspective of capital, this is the most "perfect" business logic-use the lowest cost, borrow the hottest wind, play the toughest routines, and make the most money. AI has never been the real reason for the price increase of civilian storage, but it is just a fig leaf used by giants to cover up the nature of harvesting; the so-called "tight production capacity" and "cost-effective products" are just traps they have carefully designed.
Unfortunately, under the oligopoly pattern, ordinary consumers have little room for resistance and can only passively accept this arranged harvest. The only thing that can be done is to see this routine clearly, consume rationally, and not be kidnapped by "cost-effective" gimmicks-after all, what you think of as "picking up leaks" is just a "leek game" that the giants have long planned.
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