China’s Xian lockdown could lead to shortage of memory chips around the world

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<strong>Micron Technology, a world leader in innovating memory and storage solutions, has warned that the closure of Chinese city Xian due to the Covid-19 lockdown will impact its output levels of memory chips assembly and test operations.</strong></p>
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Starting December 23, as many as 13 million residents of Xian – once the starting point for the ancient Silk Road and also the provincial capital of Shaanxi province – have been put under a strict lockdown as the China faces one of the biggest outbreaks of Covid-19 cases in the past few months.<br />
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The closure has significantly affected the functioning of several major companies in the region, including Micron which manufactures the industry's broadest portfolio of memory and storage technologies: DRAM, NAND, and NOR memory.<br />
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"New or more stringent restrictions impacting our operations in Xian may be increasingly difficult to mitigate. We will continue to address the situation proactively and work closely with our customers, suppliers and logistics partners to ensure we minimize any impact to delivery schedules," Micron said in a <a href="https://in.micron.com/about/blog/2021/december/micron-statement-on-current-situation-in-xi-an-china">statement</a>.<br />
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The company said that it is in full compliance with the Xian government's city closure and has temporarily reduced its workforce density at the local facility. Minimizing the impact of the situation and maintaining operations at the site safely in coordination with the local government officials remains its priority, as of now.<br />
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"We are tapping our global supply chain, including our subcontractor partners, to help service our customers for these DRAM products. We project that these efforts will allow us to meet most of our customer demand, however there may be some near-term delays as we activate our network," the statement added.<br />
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According to the Chinese health authorities, the total number of Covid-19 cases reported from Xian since December 9 has crossed 1100, with 155 new infections confirmed yesterday.  <br />
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As of December 28, China's National Health Commission had received reports of 101,683 confirmed cases and 4,636 deaths in 31 provincial-level regions since the start of the pandemic.<br />
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<strong>Also Read: <a href="https://www.indianarrative.com/world-news/million-locked-in-ancient-chinese-city-amid-massive-covid-surge-137133.html">13 million locked in ancient Chinese city amid massive Covid surge</a></strong></p>