Since the fourth quarter of 2020, chips have been out of stock, and in 2021, it has become more and more serious. Not only car chips are out of stock, but all chips are out of stock, and the entire semiconductor industry is affected.
There are exactly three key factors, and they happen to be all together. If these three factors are not together, it will not be so lacking.
The first factor is the epidemic. We know that the 2020 epidemic will result in a reduction in the production capacity of manufacturing plants around the world, and workers have not been reinstated.
Also the epidemic has caused everyone to work and study at home. As a result, TVs, computers, cameras, cloud computing, and remote technology have developed, and orders for chips in these fields have increased.
In addition, while the epidemic began to cause tension on automotive chips, another thing happened that the chip ban against Huawei was tightened
This has caused Huawei to stock up on chips and step up additional orders to foundries, producing as many as it can produce, squeezing all its production capacity. Not only that, but also caused Xiaomi, OPPO, VIVO, etc. to step up stockpiling. One is to expand production capacity to grab the market that Huawei will vacate, and the other is to make good reserves for fear that they will also receive a ban.
As a result, market demand continues to increase significantly, and the already tight production capacity has become more tight, and other manufacturers have followed the trend and stockpiled, resulting in an increase of more than 2-3% under normal demand, which has caused a full range of production capacity, not only car chips, but also consumer-grade .The chips are strained across the board.
And behind these two things, there is another factor, that is, foundries have slowly adjusted their production capacity from 8-inch wafers to 12-inch wafers, because 8-inch wafers are mainly used for 28nm and above processes. The inch is mainly used for 14nm and below processes.For foundries, 12-inch wafers have higher yields and more advanced technology. But this has led to tight 8-inch wafer production capacity as many automotive chips and consumer electronics are based on 8-inch wafers.
After these three key factors are put together, the global chip is out of stock, from car chips to the entire production chain. This situation will take about a year to alleviate. After all, the chips have quite strict processes. Manufacturers No random adjustments are allowed, and security and stability are the first demands.
