When the founder and CEO of the world’s largest publicly-traded company took the stage at CES in Las Vegas, attendees expected major announcements, but new consumer GPU hardware products were conspicuously absent from Jensen Huang’s keynote address.
Instead, he touted the latest and greatest that NVIDIA has to offer in the realm of AI computing. The rising cost of computer parts and ongoing DRAM shortages affecting production have forced the American chipmaker to bring back the GeForce RTX 3060s again – a GPU released in February 2021 and discontinued in August 2024.
Global GPU And Memory Shortages Force NVIDIA To Bring Back GeForce RTX 3060 Series
The GeForce RTX 3060 series is widely popular among gamers with mid-range PCs. The lineup also included the RTX 3060 Ti models and Lite Hash Rate (LHR) variant designed specifically for cryptocurrency mining. However, this is not the first time the card has been linked to an end-of-production timeline. In August 2024, NVIDIA asked partners to place final orders for RTX 3060, with the last chips moving through the supply chain in the following months as the company moved to introduce the RTX 40 and 50 series.
However, with the rapid consumption of DRAMs by AI data centers globally, it has become harder and more expensive for the company to procure the GDDR7 needed to produce its newer and more powerful GeForce RTX 5060 GPUs.
According to reliable NVIDIA leaker Honngxing2020, NVIDIA is planning to restart production of the GPUs in Q1 2026, just weeks after the “end of new stock” claims. Though he did not provide any details on whether the update refers to the 12GB or the 8GB version, the RTX 3060 uses GDDR6 memory, which may be less affected by the upcoming price hikes for GDDR7-based graphics cards.
NVIDIA To Reduce Production Of GDDR7-Based RTX 50 Series GPUs By 30-40%, Affecting Prices
NVIDIA is also set to reduce the production of its RTX 50-series GPUs. According to a report from WCCFTech, the company could trim Blackwell gaming GPU production by 30-40% in the first half of the year. The change will initially affect mid-range models, such as the GeForce RTX 5070 Ti and RTX 5060 Ti 16GB GDDR6, which are currently the most affordable 12GB+VRAM GPUs from the company. Higher models are expensive, while lower tiers suffer from hamstrung performance in higher-fidelity games.
This is a strategic decision on the company’s part amid pressure from data center clients that are buying up all the hardware. Supply shortage of memory and SSDs has led to their prices rising, which means the rate of PC purchasing and upgrades will be diminished in the coming months. WCCFTech reported that, unlike AMD, which is expected to hike GPU prices by 10% or more from 2027, NVIDIA is avoiding price hikes. However, partners producing fewer supplies will likely want to increase their margins, which could result in price increases on the supplier’s end.
The reduction in RTX 50 supply and plans to bring back the RTX 30 series could help lay the groundwork for the long-rumored refresh for the 50-series, which has been delayed by the shortage of new 3GB GDDR7 VRAM modules. Latest reports suggest that NVIDIA may be hoarding those modules for use in the GeForce RTX 5090 laptop GPUs.
Jensen Huang Says ‘AI Immigrants’ will Do Jobs That Humans Refuse, And Propel The Economy
Meanwhile, at a Q&A session at CES 2026, NVIDIA chief Jensen Huang referred to AI-powered robots as “AI immigrants”. His comments were related to how robotics may take over jobs that humans wish to pass. He noted that robots will create new jobs, eliminating global labor shortages, which are in the tens of millions.
Huang said,
“We no longer, as a population, will be able to sustain the economies that we would like to have. So we need to have more AI immigrants to help us on the manufacturing floors and do the type of work that maybe we decided not to do anymore,”
The NVIDIA CEO followed up his statements by saying that the robotics revolution will drive the economy forward, allowing for more jobs to hire more people. He added that ultimately he wants the economy to do well and inflation to stay low so that more jobs are created and “living will be more affordable.”
NVIDIA (Nasdaq: NVDA) closed Tuesday’s trading session at $187.24 – down 1.61% for the day.
