Apple May Raise Product Prices as Memory, Storage Costs Surge

New Delhi — Apple may raise prices on some products as rising memory and storage chip costs, driven by demand from artificial intelligence data centers, put pressure on the company’s margins, according to a report.

Apple CEO Tim Cook told The Wall Street Journal that the company can no longer fully absorb the sharp increase in component costs and may eventually pass some of the burden on to consumers.

“Unfortunately, price increases are unavoidable,” Cook was quoted as saying.

“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.”

Cook did not say when the price increases could take effect, how large they might be or which Apple products would be affected.

The comments come amid growing concern over the impact of AI-related demand on global semiconductor supply chains. Industry groups representing automakers, retailers and electronics manufacturers have warned that rising demand for memory chips could lead to higher consumer prices and supply disruptions.

According to the report, memory and storage components have become a major concern for Apple, especially in the dynamic random-access memory market. DRAM supplies have tightened as chipmakers allocate more production capacity to high-bandwidth memory used in AI servers.

Cook said more memory supply is being directed toward AI infrastructure, leaving less available for consumer electronics.

“There’s less supply at a time when consumers want devices and the memory guys are passing along huge price increases,” he said.

Cook said memory pricing and supply need to return to reasonable levels for consumer products.

In April, Apple announced that John Ternus, senior vice president of hardware engineering, will succeed Cook as chief executive officer on September 1, 2026, after a succession process unanimously approved by the company’s board.

Cook will move into the newly created role of executive chairman, where he will work with global policymakers and assist with select company matters. (Source: IANS)