Core view
Semiconductor: the global semiconductor supply chain is still fragile, and the supply and demand mismatch of medical equipment, automobiles and broadband chips is serious
The US Department of Commerce released the survey results of semiconductor supply chain, and the demand for chips in 2021 increased by 17% compared with 2019. On January 25, us time, the US Department of Commerce announced the survey results of information obtained from global semiconductor supply chain enterprises from September 2021. The results show that the shortage of semiconductors is caused by the following reasons: first, it is difficult to invest in semiconductor production before 2020. The production of equipment used to manufacture relatively mature chips and various mature products (diodes, capacitors, etc.) has decreased. Second, the rise of demand side 5g, electric vehicles and other applications has driven a substantial increase in demand. According to the data collection survey of supply chain enterprises, the median chip demand of semiconductor buyers in 2021 increased by 17% compared with 2019, while the supply side did not see significant growth, resulting in serious supply-demand mismatch. Third, the covid-19 epidemic, factory fire, snow storm and other black swan events led to the shutdown of semiconductor enterprises and serious obstruction of the supply side.
The semiconductor industry chain is still fragile. American semiconductor consumers said that the days of inventory of semiconductors in 2021 was less than 5 days, and the supply and demand mismatch of medical equipment, automobiles and broadband chips was serious. According to the survey of semiconductor supply chain enterprises, the industry generally believes that the effective methods to solve the chip shortage include increasing production, supply chain management, minimizing capacity interruption and optimizing the use of chips through product design. In the past year, the U.S. government has strengthened cooperation with semiconductor industry associations and enterprises to increase the transparency of the industrial chain and minimize the shutdown crisis. However, even so, at present, the global semiconductor industry chain is still relatively fragile, and the demand far exceeds the supply. Enterprises said that the current median number of semiconductor inventory days has dropped from 40 days in 2019 to 5 days in 2021. Some key products have even lower inventory days, including microcontrollers (40, 90, 150, 180, 250nm nodes), analog chips (40, 130, 160, 180, 800nm nodes) and optoelectronic chips (65, 110, 180nm nodes). These chips mainly affect the medical equipment, automobile, broadband chip and other industries, so that the chip shortage in these industries is more serious.
In 2021, China’s output of integrated circuits reached 359.4 billion, a year-on-year increase of 33.3%. According to the official data of the National Bureau of statistics, the output of China’s integrated circuits (including those produced by local enterprises and foreign-funded factories) reached 359.4 billion in 2021, a year-on-year increase of 33.3%, which was significantly accelerated in 2021 compared with the growth rate of 16.2% in 2020. The rapid growth of chip production reflects China’s efforts to increase production by achieving semiconductor self-sufficiency under the background of long-term chip shortage.
We believe that the relevant data of semiconductor industry chain enterprises released by the U.S. Department of Commerce once again reveals the current core shortage crisis faced by the industry, and the imbalance between supply and demand has not been recovered. At the same time, it once again emphasizes the importance of new chip capacity. Although the U.S. government began to introduce policy subsidies to stimulate the return of semiconductor manufacturing industry to the United States, on the whole, on the one hand, the cost of human and material resources in the United States is high, on the other hand, there are always problems such as being far away from China and other large countries with terminal demand. It is difficult for the United States to realize the return of manufacturing industry. China has the advantages of low cost and close proximity to end consumers. At the same time, China has a prominent ability to deal with black swan events such as covid-19 epidemic and natural disasters, and has a strong ability to avoid the shutdown risk caused by accidents. The semiconductor production capacity is expected to continue to grow in the next few years.
Risk tips
The downstream demand of semiconductor is lower than expected; Covid-19 epidemic repeatedly caused the risk of production capacity obstruction.
Related subject matter
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