If you were hoping that we were approaching the end of the GPU shortage, you might want to settle in for the long haul. While there have been indications of the semiconductor shortage easing a little bit, some high-level executives within the industry have suggested that it may still be a long time before supply can catch up entirely with demand.
Huang indicated as much in a call with investors following NVIDIA’s Q2 FY 2022 earnings call, saying, “I would expect that we will see a supply-constrained environment for the vast majority of next year is my guess at the moment.” A full transcript of the call can be found over at Seeking Alpha.
So, it seems that the shortage will continue for some time to come, but that isn’t as dire a prediction as it may seem on the surface. While it’s easy to believe that it’ll still be a long time before supply completely catches up with demand, supply is going to become easier to find as time goes on. In other words, the shortage will ease more and more with time until supply meets demand and GPUs are easily obtainable.
Of course, to someone who has been trying to get one of NVIDIA’s new cards for months without success, the idea that the shortage will get better slowly over time probably isn’t a very reassuring notion right now. In any case, we’ll see if Huang’s prediction comes true as we move closer to 2022, so stay tuned for more.