Apple's price increases are planned by Apple as the cost of memory chip and storage continues to increase due to the explosive demand caused by the development of artificial intelligence infrastructure.
Company CEO Tim Cooke admitted that the situation has become unsustainable, as suppliers are constantly shifting higher costs to electronic devices manufacturers.
"Unfortunately, price increases are inevitable," Tim Cook said in an interview with the Wall Street Journal. "We are doing our utmost to limit the great price increases that are being transferred to us and we are trying to protect our customers, but the situation has now become unsustainable.".
The rapid development of data centres supporting artificial intelligence applications has intensified competition to ensure critical components, leading to limited availability and significant price increases. As early as the month, associations representing car companies, retailers and electronics companies had warned that increased demand for memory chips could cause significant price increases in consumer goods in the United States and create problems in supply chains.
Apple head, who is to hand over the company's management to John Ternus in September, did not reveal the height of the increases nor the timetable for their implementation. At the same time, he avoided specifying which products would be affected.
His statements come at a time when Apple allegedly prepares the presentation of the first folding iPhone in September, along with the new iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max.
Cook pointed out that the situation in the DRAM market is of particular concern, stressing that more and more of the production is directed towards High bandwidth memory (HBM), which are used on artificial intelligence servers.
"The offer decreases when consumers are still asking for devices and memory providers are imposing huge price increases," he said. "We definitely need a return to reasonable price levels and availability for consumer products. This is the key issue.".
Referring to a global supply chain, Apple’s CEO noted that China It has strong domestic memory and storage companies, although US companies would need special permits to cooperate with them due to national security restrictions. Asked whether these restrictions should be relaxed, he replied that "all options should be considered", adding that the market needs to use any available source of supply.
Cook also hinted that Apple is willing to use its significant cash available to contribute to increase in production capacity in the area of memorials, but without giving more details. "We are willing to use our balance sheet to be part of the solution. It is obvious that more production capacity is required," he said.
It made it clear, however, that Apple has no plans to use its cash and know-how in the semiconductor sector to build its own memory and storage plants.