[DigitalToday Kyung-min Hong (홍경민), intern reporter] Global PC maker HP is maintaining a stable management flow despite the external headwind of a recent surge in memory (RAM) prices, supported by preemptive inventory 확보 and diversification of its product lineup.

On Feb. 25 (local time), IT outlets TechRadar and Ars Technica reported that HP said in its fiscal 2026 first-quarter results announcement that memory purchasing costs jumped about 100 percent from a year earlier, pushing the bill of materials share up to 35 percent. The rise in costs is expected to continue for the time being.

HP executives said higher memory unit prices could lead to weaker demand across the market, but laid out multiple strategies to address it. Chief Financial Officer Karen Parkhill said HP would firm up its overall profit structure by optimising prices to reflect higher costs and increasing the share of profits from non-memory areas such as IT services and peripherals.

This is seen as a strategy for an advanced business model that offsets risks from rising hardware manufacturing costs with service and software revenue.

A key point is HP's agile supply chain management capability. Interim Chief Executive Bruce Broussard stressed that HP is responding quickly to market changes by securing volumes through long-term supply contracts, actively finding new suppliers and cutting parts certification time in half. The industry is rating highly HP's efforts to maximise operational efficiency by expanding partnerships to Asian chip makers such as China's CXMT to fill gaps in its existing supply chain and by adopting an AI-based end-to-end planning process to optimise complex logistics costs.

HP is also pursuing a strategy to broaden customer choices with a model lineup that diversifies memory specifications. It aims to meet the needs of a range of consumer groups even under supply imbalances by adjusting reliance on high-spec memory and expanding product lines with practical configurations.

This is not simply lowering specifications, but a practical portfolio strategy aimed at maintaining price competitiveness by proposing customised hardware configurations optimised for users' actual work environments. Ketan Patel, president of the Personal Systems business, added: "We are leveraging silicon diversity to give customers a range of choices and focusing on balancing supply and demand."

As a result of this active response, HP posted first-quarter Personal Systems revenue of $10.3 billion, up 11 percent from a year earlier, and PC sales volumes also maintained double-digit growth. Solid demand in business PCs in particular supported the performance, proving unshaken market dominance even in a crisis.

The impact of the memory crunch is expected to continue in the second half, but HP is expected to keep growing as a leader in the global PC market by turning an uncertain market environment into an opportunity on the back of stronger supply-chain resilience and AI-centred management innovation.