Sticker shock comes quick to Apple store
Company blames soaring cost of chips, though AI data centers add pressure
ANOTHER VIEW | CHICAGO TRIBUNE
Aweek after Apple CEO Tim Cook warned that price hikes for the company's devices were "unavoidable" due to soaring costs in key components, consumers woke up to just how steep and immediate those increases would be.
Try up to 20% for many of Apple's popular laptop computers.
And up to 25% for iPads. On Apple's website, the price of the base MacBook Air now is $1,299, which will set you back $200 more than before the increase. At $1,199, the iPad Pro costs $200 more now, too.
For now, iPhone prices haven't changed, but that's not likely to hold. Apple is scheduled to unveil its iPhone 18 in September, so look for iPhone fallout around then if not sooner.
The culprit, Apple says, is the soaring costs of memory and storage computer chips, which make the company's computers and other devices work. The prices for those components have risen by roughly four times over the past year, according to The Wall Street Journal, due in large part to competing demand from data-center developers who have a lot to answer for these days.
Even though it is invested in artificial intelligence, Apple was quick to point the finger in that direction. "The rapid expansion of AI data centers has created an extraordinary surge in demand for memory and storage," Apple said in a statement. "We have never seen a component price increase this much, this quickly."
Users of Apple products now know the same feeling. They've never seen price increases like this before, either.
As is often the case when companies displease their customers en masse, there's lots of finger-pointing. Not coincidentally, Boise, Idaho-based Micron Technologies, a leading chipmaker, reported year-over-year revenue growth of 346%.Net income in the fiscal third quarter, which ended May 28, climbed to $28.2 billion from $1.9 billion in the same period in 2025.
Micron's nearly unbelievable trajectory in just a year is due overwhelmingly to data-center demand, the company said. The supply pressure will last at least through next year, Micron told analysts.
Translation for Apple users: Don't expect relief anytime soon.
Micron did its own finger-pointing, with an executive telling the Journal that "a couple of (Micron's) customers were being very aggressive with pricing" in 2023 when the chip industry was in the dumpster. That led to a decline in production now contributing to the supply pinch. He didn't name names, but the implication was that Apple, which is known for leveraging its immense scale to squeeze suppliers, was one of those "very aggressive" players.
Add this tech-device sticker shock to the pile of other inflationary drivers — the price at the pump, noticeably higher grocery bills, rising housing costs — making people cranky.
Like fuel, food and shelter, smartphones and laptops are necessities for most of us. Consumers double as voters, too.
