Macronix, Nintendo’s primary supplier of ROM chips for Switch and Switch 2 game cartridges, is exiting the ROM business entirely — effective immediately. The Taiwanese memory manufacturer confirmed it will stop developing and selling new ROM products after Q3 2026, its last quarter reporting ROM sales separately. CEO Miin Wu cited a 39% year-on-year decline in ROM revenue and a sharp drop in contribution to total sales: from 26% a year ago to just 5% today.
Macronix’s Q3 net profit hit $337 million, but that growth is coming from NOR flash demand in data centers, not gaming hardware. And yes, this is the same Macronix that supplies the ROM layer inside physical Switch cartridges, the part that stores the game’s boot code and critical firmware, even on NAND-based Switch 2 carts.
Switch 2 cartridges do use NAND flash for main game storage, a segment Macronix is keeping, but they still rely on discrete ROM chips for secure boot and authentication. That component is now being phased out. Nintendo has not commented. Neither has Sony or Microsoft, though neither uses ROM chips in their current-gen physical media.
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