Apple’s Fight With Micron Just Took a Wild Turn — And It Could Reshape the Memory Market
Apple is seeking approval for Chinese suppliers to ease a memory shortage, while Micron warns the plan could undercut U.S. chipmakers.
- Apple Chief Executive Tim Cook has lobbied the Trump administration to approve using memory chips from ChangXin Memory Technologies and Yangtze Memory Technologies in products sold outside the U.S., a proposal Micron is actively opposing.
- Micron executives recently suggested that aggressive purchasing tactics from Apple helped fuel the memory shortage, arguing that rock-bottom prices during the 2023 market downturn discouraged necessary investment in production capacity.
- Apple hiked MacBook and iPad prices 20% citing a memory shortage it called a "100-year flood." Apple accuses Micron of price-gouging with gross margins above 80%, though Micron counters that prices reflect genuine scarcity.
- Both CXMT and YMTC are Pentagon-designated Chinese military companies, and YMTC remains on the Commerce Department's Entity List. Micron Chief Executive Sanjay Mehrotra warned Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick that allowing these suppliers could destroy domestic industry.
- President Donald Trump must now balance affordable consumer prices against robust domestic semiconductor production. To gain political capital, Apple has touted its $600 billion American Manufacturing Program, yet the administration has offered little indication of its path forward.
15 Articles
15 Articles
Apple-Micron Conflict Over China's Semiconductor Regulations... What Will Trump Choose? The U.S. government finds itself in a difficult situation as the conflict intensifies between Apple, which is lobbying for permission to use Chinese memory, and Micron, which is trying to block this. If the government sides with Apple, it will hinder the goal of expanding domestic semiconductor production.
Micron urges White House to reject Apple's blacklist memory plan
Apple's plan to buy memory from a blacklisted supplier is receiving some pushback from Micron, which claims it will destabilize the U.S. tech industry.Micron memory chips - Image Credit: MicronIn June, Apple petitioned the Trump administration to allow it to buy Mac RAM chips from a supplier blacklisted in the United States. Now, a U.S. memory producer has urged President Trump not to give in to Apple's request.According to the Wall Street Journ…
Apple’s Fight With Micron Just Took a Wild Turn — And It Could Reshape the Memory Market
Apple is lobbying Washington for permission to buy memory chips from a Chinese company blacklisted for military ties, and the reason it's willing to take that political risk reveals something uncomfortable about how Silicon Valley's most profitable company talks about fair pricing.
(Seoul = Yonhap News) Reporter Im Hwa-seop = Apple, which is engaging in aggressive lobbying to use Chinese-made memory, and Micron, which is strongly demanding that this be blocked...
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