Dec 3 (Reuters) – Memory chipmaker Micron Technology said on Wednesday it will exit its consumer business, as it doubles down on advanced memory chips used in artificial intelligence data centers amid a global supply shortage of the essential semiconductors.

Shares of the company were down 2.6% in afternoon trading.

Micron’s move to dissolve its consumer business comes against a backdrop of worldwide strain in memory supply chains, with tight availability of semiconductors ranging from flash chips used in smartphones to advanced high-bandwidth memory, or HBM, employed in AI data centers.

It will halt the sale of the “Crucial” unit’s consumer-branded products at retailers, e-tailers and distributors worldwide, but will continue product shipments through the consumer channel until Februar

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