Helium may have stolen the spotlight as the Gulf crisis continues to expose the fragility of global supply chains, but a lesser-known yet equally important regional export is now under scrutiny.
Bromine is a raw material used by specialised chemical suppliers to produce semiconductor-grade hydrogen bromide gas.
This specialty gas is used to carve precise, microscopic patterns onto silicon wafers. It can be thought of as an ultra-precise chemical ‘chisel’ that enables the formation of the tiny circuit structures, or transistors, inside modern chips and smartphones.
Bromine itself is part of an ultra-concentrated supply chain originating in the Dead Sea, with Israel the world’s leading exporter.
Around two-thirds of global bromine production comes from Israel and Jordan, according to the US Geological Survey.
Ray Wang, a Seoul-based analyst at SemiAnalysis told news outlet CNBC that a prolonged conflict could disrupt chipmakers’ access to both helium and bromine, although the current impact on bromine remains limited.
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This is due to Israeli chemical manufacturer ICL Group routing most of its trade through Mediterranean ports at Haifa and Ashdod, bypassing the Strait of Hormuz.
But with Israel actively involved in the conflict and Jordan in close proximity, there is a growing risk of disruption to bromine supply that the semiconductor industry cannot ignore.
In fact, ballistic missiles launched by Iran have hit Dimona and Arad, both within 35km of ICL’s Dead Sea extraction and conversion complex.
Large circle: the location of recent Iran missile strikes. Small circle: the location of ICL’s bromine extraction and conversion complex ©Moo Moo Technologies
According to Global Banking and Finance, war risk insurance for vessel calls at Israeli ports has already risen from 0.2% to between 0.7 and 1% of vessel value per seven-day call.
For a mid-sized cargo ship, this adds up to $500,000 in costs per voyage.
This exposure is significant. Around 97.5% of bromine imports into South Korea originate from Israel, according to available data.
South Korea, in turn, dominates global memory production, accounting for roughly 73% of DRAM and around 51% of NAND flash output through Samsung and SK hynix.
This level of concentration is also reinforcing efforts to diversify semiconductor supply chains beyond traditional hubs.
Countries such as Vietnam are increasingly being positioned as , supported by policy initiatives and growing investment in chip design and packaging.
While still at an early stage, such developments reflect a broader push to reduce reliance on geographically concentrated supply chains and improve resilience against disruptions to critical materials.
Dynamic random-access memory (DRAM) is a type of semiconductor memory used as the primary, temporary storage in computers, smartphones and servers. It is used whenever applications are opened or data is actively processed.
Not AND – or NAND – is a type of memory technology that retains data without power, commonly used in SSDs, USB flash drives, and smartphones. It is also used in gaming consoles for high-capacity storage and faster load times.
Despite Israel’s dominance in bromine supply, the primary constraint is not raw material availability, but how irreplaceable the gas is and how essential the conversion infrastructure becomes when producing semiconductor-grade hydrogen bromide.
According to Alvin Camba, Lead Scientist and Director of Research at AI/analytics company Lyvi, hydrogen bromide gas achieves levels of precision that cannot be matched by chlorine-based alternatives.
Hydrogen bromide gas plasmas achieve a polysilicon-to-oxide selectivity ratio of 100 to 1, while alternatives – which use gases such as chlorine – achieve roughly 30 to 1. Put simply, this can be the difference between a functional transistor and a defective one.
The vulnerability extends beyond raw material supply. The greater risk lies in the conversion process itself, where limited global capacity and highly specialised purification requirements leave little room for substitution or rapid scaling.
Converting raw bromine into semiconductor-grade hydrogen bromide gas requires gas-phase distillation systems capable of reducing trace metal contamination to parts-per-billion levels.
The ultra-pure gas is produced by companies including Air Liquide, Resonac, and Adeka. However, existing capacity is already committed to major semiconductor customers such as TSMC, Samsung, and SMIC, leaving little flexibility in the event of disruption.
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At the same time, building new hydrogen bromide purification capacity involves lengthy permitting, specialised equipment and qualification with chipmakers, a process that typically takes years rather than months.
The immediacy of the risk is compounded by limited inventories. DRAM producers typically hold just two to three weeks of supply, meaning any sustained disruption to hydrogen bromide availability would begin to impact production within weeks rather than months.
According to electronic component distributer ASC Global, DRAM contract prices are projected to rise 58 to 63% in Q2 2026, while NAND Flash (SSD) prices may surge by up to 75%.
In the event of a supply constraint, manufacturers are also likely to prioritise higher-margin products such as high-bandwidth memory used in AI applications. AI data centres are now estimated to consume around 70% of high-end DRAM in 2026.
This could come at the expense of commodity DRAM and NAND used in consumer devices, amplifying price pressures across smartphones, laptops and data storage markets.
In fact, analysts predict the sub-$500 PC segment will vanish by 2028 because memory now accounts for 23% of the total Bill of Materials.
More broadly, the issue highlights a structural vulnerability in the full semiconductor supply chain.
