The MacBook Neo's $599 launch price wasn't generosity. It was arithmetic. And the math just changed.

When Apple unveiled the MacBook Neo in March, the question everyone asked was whether a $599 Mac was real. It was. The follow-up question, whether Apple could sustain that price, got far less attention, because the answer required understanding something about how chips get made that Apple never advertised and most coverage never explained.

That answer is now becoming unavoidable. Supply chain analyst Tim Culpan reported this week that Apple has doubled its MacBook Neo production target from roughly 5 to 6 million units to 10 million, and that hitting the new number requires TSMC to manufacture a fresh run of A18 Pro chips. That last part is the piece that matters. For the first 5 million MacBook Neos, Apple didn't order a single extra chip. It used the ones it already had.