Reuters (June 24)
“The AI boom has led to the biggest upswing ever, as demand for memory created a huge bottleneck.” Micron Technologies, now worth $1.3 trillion, has benefited handsomely from this “as the company’s ballooning gross margin shows,” but the rise “is straining tech giants and investor credulity alike.” It won’t last forever. “Boom and bust cycles are built on human greed. It’s very hard to resist the urge to keep boosting production when times are good. Historical patterns suggest the memory shortage will likely end suddenly and hard.”
Tags: AI boom, Ballooning, Boom, Bottleneck, Bust, Credulity, Demand, Gross margin, Human greed, Investor, Memory, Micron, Production, Tech giants, Upswing
Financial Times (May 22)
“China ordered a swath of its infrastructure companies to stop buying from US chipmaker Micron” hours after the G7 ended and President Biden spoke of a thaw in relations. China also summoned Japan’s ambassador to protest related issues. This “underscored the big challenges to stabilising US-China relations at the end of a summit in Hiroshima where Biden and other leaders of the advanced economies issued their harshest criticism of Beijing — while also acknowledging the need to co-operate with China.”
Tags: Ambassador, Biden, Challenges, China, Chipmaker, G7, Hiroshima, Japan, Micron, Protest, Relations, Summit, Thaw, U.S.
