AI data center boom pushes Caterpillar, Ford, and other US firms into new businesses
Powering AI is becoming big business
Manufacturing articles
Apple will begin assembling Mac Minis at Foxconn's Houston plant later this year
Foxconn is building the production line while Apple will buy the computers made there
SK Hynix is spending $38 billion to build two new chip fabs
The Y2 fab will focus on HBM and next-gen DRAM, while the M17 plant will mainly produce NAND flash
SpaceX and Tesla plan their own natural gas power plants for massive $16.8 billion Texas chip factory
It will generate much of its own electricity with natural gas plants and massive battery arrays
Apple's A20 Pro production is going smoothly, except DRAM supply is bottlenecking iPhone assembly
TSMC is sitting on $1 billion worth of finished iPhone chips with nowhere to go
Ripple effect: In the run-up to the launch of the foldable iPhone Ultra, iPhone 18, and iPhone 18 Pro, Apple and its assemblers are working to secure enough mobile DRAM. Apple leans heavily on Micron for these chips and also buys from SK Hynix and Samsung. People involved say they still expect to meet initial demand, but they worry online wait times could stretch and store inventory could run out quickly if the shortage continues.
Lawsuit claims Micron's $100 billion New York chip fab could discharge "forever chemicals" into the Oneida River
PFAS exposure has been linked to cancer, reproductive problems, and weakened immune response
Google plans to produce up to 15 million AI chips by 2028, rivaling Nvidia's total accelerator volume
Intel Foundry reportedly secures orders to help produce millions of Google chips
Samsung lands Broadcom AI chip deal worth more than $200 billion through 2030
The long-term partnership spans chip manufacturing, HBM memory, and advanced packaging
TSMC plans up to 10% price increases on advanced and mature nodes starting in 2027
Price hikes could affect 7nm chips as well as older 12nm, 16nm, and 28nm nodes
Chinese memory maker CXMT's output has grown from 40,000 to 720,000 wafers in a few years, and it's closing in on Micron
Corsair and other brands are increasingly relying on CXMT-made DRAM chips
TSMC plans include at least four more 2nm fabs in $100 billion Arizona expansion
The investment could eventually bring the Arizona campus to 10 fabs and two advanced packaging plants
This GE Appliances plant couldn't keep workers until it built an app, like an Uber for factory work
More than 900 workers now choose their own hours, trading benefits and higher pay for total flexibility
Japanese firm reverses Blu-ray drive exit after securing parts, but prices jump up to 51%
Production will continue only until the current batch of components runs out
Ford learned the hard way that AI can't replace experienced engineers
Ford's AI rollout backfired, so it hired back 350 engineers to fix it
SK Hynix just surpassed Samsung to become South Korea's most valuable company
The chipmaker that nearly went bankrupt in 2002 is now worth $1.35 trillion because of AI
Trump says Apple will work with Intel to build chips in the US
Intel could gain a major foundry customer as Apple looks to reduce its reliance on TSMC
What just happened? President Trump says that Apple has agreed to work with Intel to design and build its chips in America. In a Truth Social post, Trump complained that "Stupid Presidents" had "let Taiwan and others steal our Semiconductor Factories."
Samsung's foundry is booming as TSMC struggles with demand – bags Nvidia, Tesla, and Qualcomm as new clients
Google and AMD could also get their next-generation chips manufactured by Samsung
"The retail SSD market has almost disappeared," Silicon Motion says, as OEMs take what's left
Situation expected to worsen in 2027
The "Made in America" Trump phone is just a reskinned HTC U24 built in China
And the American flag design is missing two stripes
Nothing CEO warns memory costs now exceed 50% of smartphone's hardware bill
The structural shift is coming, faster than anticipated
SK Hynix moves 375-layer NAND into mass production, replacing tungsten with molybdenum
Future 480-layer and 604-layer designs will require major manufacturing changes
TSMC CEO says it will be "a long time" before they can meet AI chip demand, with price hikes likely
The chip crunch could run for years, unless the boom becomes a bubble
A startup is using AI to find lithium deposits directly beneath Europe's battery factories
Volkswagen and LG have giant battery plants in Germany and Poland. A US startup thinks there's lithium sitting right beneath them
Micron just made the most advanced DRAM ever produced in the US, and it's not for your PC
The 1-alpha node brings advanced DDR4 production to Virginia fab
TSMC workers threaten Samsung-style strike over rumored bonus cuts despite record profits
TSMC says bonuses have not been cut and promises faster growth next year, but workers are still angry