The world’s largest tech firms show no signs of easing up on AI spending, a record wave that’s propelling hardware providers like Samsung Electronics Co. and SK Hynix Inc. That’s even as doubts persist about the staying power of artificial intelligence demand to justify all that capital. Its suppliers have responded in kind: On Thursday, SK Hynix said it plans a “considerable increase” in capex, and Samsung said it’s ratcheting up spending on its memory production capacity. Microsoft Corp. shares slid 6.1% after revealing a slowdown in cloud services growth, while Meta climbed 6.6%. A procession of industry linchpins reported results this week that underscored how voracious the appetite for AI hardware has grown — and how that’s likely to extend well into 2026. Photographer: SeongJoon Cho/BloombergSamsung and SK Hynix — two makers of the memory chips that go into Nvidia Corp.’s essential AI accelerators as well as data center servers — reported profits that grew several-fold.