Apple boss Tim Cook has warned consumers that prices on some of its products will increase as the costs associated with memory and storage chips continue to surge. In a new interview with The Wall Street Journal, Cook declared such price rises were “unavoidable.”
“We’re doing our best to mitigate the huge increases that are being passed to us, and we’ve been trying to shield our customers from the increases, but the situation has become unsustainable,” said Cook.
The boom in artificial intelligence and the explosive growth of the AI industry has come with enormous demand from the latter for memory components that consumer electronics need.
“There’s less supply at a time when consumers want devices and the memory guys are passing along huge price increases,” said Cook.
According to estimates from research firm TechInsights, cited by The Wall Street Journal, components that previously cost Apple around $50 in the iPhone 17 Pro could be costing the company approximately $200 in the iPhone 18 Pro.
“We definitely need memory pricing and supply to return to reasonable levels for consumer products,” said Cook. “That’s the bottom line.”
The news will come as a familiar refrain to gamers, who are unfortunately well accustomed to the impact of rising component costs on electronics. This generation, for the first time, gamers have seen console prices consistently jacked up rather than dropped.
The AI industry’s insatiable demand for memory is already impacting the next generation, too, with both Sony and Xbox expressing concern over the significant challenges of launching new consoles amid such unprecedented demand for memory and storage chips.
Luke is a Senior Editor on the IGN reviews team. You can track him down on Bluesky @mrlukereilly to ask him things about stuff.
