Samsung CEO signals Galaxy S26 price hike amid AI chip crunch

Samsung CEO signals Galaxy S26 price hike amid AI chip crunch

Samsung Electronics signaled that price increases for its upcoming flagship smartphones may be unavoidable, as global semiconductor costs surge and internal divisions face mounting margin pressure ahead of the Galaxy S26 launch next month.

Speaking to global media ahead of the CES 2026 trade show in Las Vegas, Samsung’s co-CEO and mobile business chief, Roh Tae-moon, said the current environment is “unprecedented” and warned that “smartphone price adjustments may be necessary” due to soaring chip costs.

Roh said Monday, citing an industrywide supply crunch driven by artificial intelligence infrastructure demand,

We’re facing one of the harshest pricing situations in memory,

The price of general-purpose DRAM — 8Gb DDR4 — has risen from $1.35 to $9.30 over the past year, according to DRAMeXchange, a near sevenfold increase.

This sharp rise in memory and application processor costs comes as Samsung’s mobile division is preparing to release the Galaxy S26, which debuts both the company’s own 2-nanometer Exynos 2600 chip and AI-powered features under the Galaxy AI brand. The S26 is seen internally as a strategic product for multiple Samsung business units, including semiconductors and foundry services, and will test the competitiveness of Samsung’s vertically integrated model.

At an official CES 2026 press briefing held on Monday, Roh said Samsung also aims to ship around 400 million new AI-powered devices this year across smartphones, TVs, and home appliances, as part of its strategy to deliver a seamless “AI companion” experience across its product ecosystem.

Including past shipments, Samsung expects to have AI capabilities deployed across a cumulative 800 million devices by the end of 2026.

Roh said,

We will apply AI to all products, all functions and all services as quickly as possible,

Galaxy AI, a hybrid of Samsung’s in-house and Google’s Gemini model for its mobile devices, supports generative features such as image editing, on-device summarization and translation. Roh added that AI brand awareness among Galaxy users has risen from 30 percent to 80 percent in a year, according to its own survey.

However, questions remain over whether Samsung will begin charging for Galaxy AI services this year. Roh said in July last year that core features will remain free “for the time being,” but acknowledged that some premium functions may move to a paid model, pending internal review and discussions with partners.

The S26 launch comes at a critical juncture. Samsung lost its title as the world’s top smartphone vendor to Apple in 2025 for the first time in 14 years. According to forecasts from Counterpoint Research in November, Apple captured 19.4 percent of global smartphone shipments last year, compared to Samsung’s 18.7 percent.

Facing tougher price competition from Apple’s iPhone 17 base model that was released last year, Samsung is under pressure to maintain similar price points for the Galaxy S26, despite a significantly higher bill of materials.

Roh emphasized that Samsung is working with suppliers to develop long-term strategies to mitigate pricing impacts across its consumer electronics portfolio, including smartphones, TVs and home appliances.

READ the latest news shaping the AI Chips market at AI Chips News

Samsung CEO signals Galaxy S26 price hike amid AI chip crunch, source