Sources told Reuters that the White House has warned some companies in the chip industry to broaden their supply chains as soon as possible to prevent Russia from preventing the United States from acquiring key materials for the production of semiconductors.
Techcet, a US electronic materials market research company, issued a report on February 1, emphasizing that many semiconductor manufacturers rely heavily on materials from Russia and Ukraine, such as perfluoro butadiene, neon, palladium and so on.
According to techcet’s estimation, the US market consumes about 8 tons of perfluoro butadiene per year, and Russia is an important source of this gas. In addition, 35% of palladium comes from Russia.
In addition, more than 90% of the supply of semiconductor grade neon in the United States comes from Russia and Ukraine: Neon is produced in Russia and then purified by a professional Ukrainian company. According to the US Trade Commission (ITC), neon prices rose by 600% during the tense period of Crimea Peninsula in 2014.
According to the source, Peter Harrell, senior director of international economy and competitiveness of the National Security Council, and his colleagues have been contacting executives in the chip industry recently to understand their demand for materials from Russia and Ukraine and urge them to find alternative sources.
The White House declined to comment on the details of the conversation, but a senior official reiterated that “the U.S. government is ready. Part of the preparation is to cooperate with enterprises to prepare Russia for interfering with the supply chain.”
According to a document obtained by Reuters, Joe Pasetti, vice president of global public policy of the International Semiconductor Industry Association (semi), sent an email to members this week to assess the risks of key chip manufacturing materials.
Pasetti referred to techcet’s report and said, “if there is a potential risk of supply interruption for any material, please let us know (semi).” In addition to the perfluoro butadiene, neon and palladium mentioned by techcet, Pasetti’s email also warned of the supply risk of helium and scandium.
