Apple MacBook Neo production to be cut by 40% due to DRAM crisis

As early as the beginning of April, an analyst noted that the high demand for the MacBook Neo ($699 on Amazon) was presenting Apple with a dilemma. The company is said to have originally planned to manufacture five to six million units, relying primarily on inventory of partially defective Apple A18 Pro that have only five functional GPU cores instead of six.

Since demand turned out to be far higher than expected, Apple is said to have raised its production target to ten million units. DigiTimes now reports that this target is to be reduced by up to 40 percent, to six to seven million MacBook Neo units by the end of the year. The reason for this change is not declining demand, but rather the DRAM crisis. Production capacity at Apple’s chip manufacturer TSMC is running at full capacity, and expensive AI chips take priority over processors intended for lower-priced products like the MacBook Neo.

Apple faces a choice: expand production of the Apple A18 Pro while paying a significantly higher price for each chip, or simply produce fewer MacBook Neo units. The company is said to have opted for the latter option to avoid reducing the profit margins on the more affordable MacBook – or having to raise the price a second time just a few months after launch. For customers, however, this means that the MacBook Neo could be sold out and hard to find over the next few months.