The US Commerce Department is acting on complaints by unidentified US companies that Japanese chipmakers may be discriminating against US customers in their rationing out of critically short supplies of memory chips: since the onerous and one-sided US Japan Semiconductor Accord was calculated to encourage such retaliation now that parts are in short supply, it would not be surprising if manufacturers at minimum met all their in-house requirements before putting any parts out on the merchant market, but the Japanese Ministry of International Trade & Industry insists that the allegations are ridiculous and point to the fact that the same proportion of memory chips made about 60% – are going for export as were exported in 1986 and in 1987.
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