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Apple Begins Shipping American-Made AI Servers From Texas 47

Posted by BeauHD from the made-in-America dept.
Apple has begun shipping U.S.-made AI servers from a new factory in Houston, Texas -- part of its $600 billion investment in American manufacturing and supply chains. CNBC reports: Apple Chief Operating Officer Sabih Khan said on Thursday that the servers will power the company's Apple Intelligence and Private Cloud Compute services. Apple is using its own silicon in its Apple Intelligence servers. "Our teams have done an incredible job accelerating work to get the new Houston factory up and running ahead of schedule and we plan to continue expanding the facility to increase production next year," Khan said in a statement. The Houston factory is on track to create thousands of jobs, Apple said. The Apple servers were previously manufactured overseas.
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Apple Begins Shipping American-Made AI Servers From Texas More

Apple Begins Shipping American-Made AI Servers From Texas

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  • Do they really make their cpus in the USA, or are they still made in China?

    • ROC, not PRC, but yes.
      There are no 3nm fabs in the US capable of producing them at volume.
    • Taiwan, who is 2-3 years ahead of the USA in chip manufacturing technology.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by S. Allen ( 5756 )

        you mean 5-10. at least

        • I was being charitable, and you are probably close than I was.
        • Unlikely.
          The US produced below 3nm nodes a long time ago.

          It's a matter of market, and how quickly such a thing were to come to market in the US would be a function of how much money is available to bring it to market, and whether there is a need.

          A fab can be brought up in 3-5 years.

          • Producing a one-off in lab is completely different than producing chips at scale.

            The US doesn't have the technology to manufacture a plant to manufacture the chips at that size. It would take 20-30 years.

            Now, you can cut that by buying the equipment you need outside North America...

            • Producing a one-off in lab is completely different than producing chips at scale.

              No, it is not.
              There are however concerns that exist with scale that don't for single-runs- and that's yield.
              Companies like TSMC are trying to make the production of wafers commercially profitable, so they need high yields.
              Companies like IBM are not, so they don't.

              The US doesn't have the technology to manufacture a plant to manufacture the chips at that size. It would take 20-30 years.

              You're a moron.

              Now, you can cut that by buying the equipment you need outside North America...

              Still a moron.

              Fun history lesson for you.
              EUV is licensed by ASML by EUV LLC- an American holding.
              They issued 2 licenses, one to ASML, and one to SVG (Silicon Valley Group)
              ASML then purchased SVG becoming the sole license hold

      • Technology, no. Ability to bring to market? Yes.
        • Taiwan is at least one generation ahead of the USA in manufacturing.
          • At volume, yes. That is, and has, been true for a long time.

            In terms of the first produced wafers of any node of any density, almost all of them were done here in the US first.
            IBM produced 2nm wafers in 2021.

            I don't disagree with you on the volume- which is why I said, "tech, no. market, yes."

            • At volume, yes. That is, and has, been true for a long time.

              In terms of the first produced wafers of any node of any density, almost all of them were done here in the US first.

              IBM produced 2nm wafers in 2021.

              I don't disagree with you on the volume- which is why I said, "tech, no. market, yes."

              Producing a lab chip is closer to showing viability via a simulation than to practical production. One might think that producing the first lab chip should be a harbinger of inevitable practical yields, but Intel has destroyed that idea. We'll see what happens with 18A. Intel is claiming to have beaten TSMC to "high-volume production." We'll see whether that is reality or marketing speak.

              • Producing a lab chip is closer to showing viability via a simulation than to practical production.

                Incorrect.
                Real lithography machines are used to produce a real wafer.
                This is distinct from manufacturing, in that 99% of the game in commercial manufacturing is trying to make it commercial viable, including low yields.
                This is not a concern in a lab.
                However- the lithographical process is the same, and it's not a simulation.

                IBM doing anything doesn't mean anything for Intel. That's not how it works.
                Intel is its own fucking train wreck, and I doubt they'll ever hit high yield on an advanced process eve

                • (Note: IBM's "lab" is 100ft^2 fab that instead of being focused on commercial viability, is focused on pushing limits, and patenting what they find out)

                  It's hard to say that large-scale commercially viable semiconductor manufacturing in the US will ever be viable again.
                  Like most things, if you want a $100m one-off part with tech that you can't get anywhere else, IBM can make it for you.
                  If you want 100,000,000 of them for $0.01, Asia is probably where you want to go. The fact that Intel stayed competitiv

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by tlhIngan ( 30335 )

      The article says "assembled in the US".

      So all the parts arrive from overseas and someone puts all the parts together with screws.

      Like Dell and other white box PC manufacturers.

      • Frankly, it's a fucking confusing set of terminology no matter how you swing it.
        No assembled or manufactured product on this planet is sourced from a single country in its entirety.

        • No assembled or manufactured product on this planet is sourced from a single country in its entirety.

          This is very true. And it sort of gets weirdly fractal because many of the individual parts are also manufactured with complex supply chains. Where does the copper, silicon and chemical supplies for the manufacturing of the many ancillary chips (which may or may not be made in USA) come from? And so on.

          Only pretty simple things can be "made in X" for some X.

      • Re: (Score:2, Offtopic)

        by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

        All that matters is if Trump believes it was Made in USA or not.

  • Based off all the AI they produce it might as well be a cardboard box factory. Do they have anything smarter than siri?

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by Hadlock ( 143607 )

      The published a crude llm about a year ago that if scaled up would be similar to what everyone else is doing, but haven't published anything new since, as far as i'm aware. It's not terribly difficult to train your own ai these days, just that the gpu hours are expensive

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by r0nc0 ( 566295 )
      If you limit "AI" to mean a chatbot then who knows? There's plenty going on in lots of different teams but you'd have to be part of those teams to actually know and even then you'd only know a part of it. Apple has lots of algorithms that would qualify as AI in the current marketing terminology since any algorithm seems to be called AI these days. A few are the health algorithms that operate on the Apple Watch - some of those are neural net based and some are signal processing based algorithms. The most rec

  • new mac pro soon? as they have an server chip now?

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by SeaFox ( 739806 )

      You don't need a server chip in a workstation.
      Would be more interesting if Apple were to make a return to the "server market" with a new xServe.

  • Apple had a line of servers before. Where is that business now? Oh yeah, they pulled a Google and canned it completely. Twice, in fact. But by all means, buy Apple servers, there's absolutely no chance you will get abandoned a third time, right?

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by _merlin ( 160982 )

      Are they actually selling these servers, or just making them for their own datacentres (replacing SuperMicro)? I thought it was the latter.

  • can we get a new xserve please imcluding a model for smaller companies and individuals that doesnt cost $3000 and up and isnt just a mac mini i guess nowadays it would be Aserve or Mserve...

  • Please bring back the XServe... (Score:3)

    by ctilsie242 ( 4841247 ) on Saturday October 25, 2025 @08:58AM (#65749630)

    I wish Apple went back to selling servers. I worked at places that were very happy with XServes and the rebranded Promise arrays for SAN storage. In fact, Apple used to be the #1 storage vendor for a period of time.

    What Apple has that you don't find in the latest Dell or HPe, is Apple Silicon, and a very nice compute per watt metric, and having more bang per watt is important, not just for CPU loads, but for cooling, as you pay for the heat generated, then you pay to have that heat generated moved elsewhere. Of course, Apple will need to do something like have a standard for booting on the ARM side... but this isn't exactly an impossible barrier.

    Apple could make a mint doing what Nutanix does, if they designed a control plane for their hardware and HCI, or good backend storage via Infiniband or FC. People would buy Apple servers, just for the name, provided they did a decent job. Servers have been a part of Apple's DNA, even though hidden for a long time, even including AIX machines.

    Software-wise, the XServe was awesome for a SMB at the time. You had a directory service that worked well (LDAP), a wiki, caching, machine management, booting from remote, file sharing, backups, and a number of nice, relevant options. This makes me miss OSXS, which eventually became a weaker and weaker "server" app, then died quietly a few years ago.

    Apple might step into the server market again. They have a unique position, and can benefit from it, just like how people have embraced Apple's ARM products on the desktop.

  • You have a company run by a gay person--buying things from a hate-state.
  • I think we need this new factory designation.

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