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Global chip shortage threatens production of laptops, smartphones and more
- baybal2 6y agoCompletely crazy year. 2020 was exceptionally good for the industry after a 5-6 years long sump. Some people say it was the best one they saw in their entire careers since dotcom bubble.
- Spooky23 6y agoYup. For some computer categories, delivery dates for prioritized orders are backed up to June or July.
- kzrdude 6y agoWhich industry?
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- baybal2 6y agoMicroelectronics, and electronics
- safog 6y ago$CRSR has been killing it this year as well.
- helloycombinat 6y agoJust saying PS5 and Xbox You know there's a bump coming when a new generation of entertainment machines comes out (also applies to anything that doesn't update every year like apple ipad mini may cause a bump but it's not nearly as competitive as gaming)
- nickff 6y ago2017 and 2018 were actually good years for electronic component sales, 2019 was bad (especially in the Americas), and 2020 is kind of a mess. My source for this information is an industry report (which I can't share).
- 1-6 6y agoI wonder if yesterday's technology still keeps its value better because of this. I sure have a lot of electronics.
- tristanj 6y agoThis is a result of the bullwhip effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullwhip_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullwhip_effect Rolling supply chain disruptions were predicted to happen early this year when China shut down much of its economy due to the coronavirus.
- trhway 6y agosidenote - "Lean and JIT style management of inventories" is one of the operational causes of those supply chain inefficiencies https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullwhip_effect#Operational_causes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullwhip_effect#Operational_ca... . It is a classic result from the dynamic systems that improving the feedback in a given system may lead to destabilization of the system. Somehow it is lost on the proponents of Lean/JIT/etc. It is interesting how it has similarity with software development - several years ago i worked on a project that was being done under total Lean/Agile/Scrum regime. Scrum forces significant lead times into the upstream/downstream components chain(graph) like in a supply chain. As a result the whole upstream/downstream components graph relationship on that project got extremely slow (a sprint wait to get new upstream component version, try to use it in this sprint and fail because of bugs, file the bugs, the bugs get fixed the next sprint at best, while other components trying to move forward in their development ) and ultimately completely broke down after about 2 years to the point where the product couldn't even be built as not just functionality (the functionality got really lost months before that), the interfaces got completely out-of-wack without any chance of reconciliation in the setting of that process, and the product was quietly canceled soon as a result.
- gowld 6y agoIt's not "lost", it's a hedging tradeoff.
- sitkack 6y agoWillfully ignorant of. I remember when JIT was seen as this revelation due to UPS and other shippers stream lining their processes. So this window opened up and folks were like, "we can collapse our supply chains to UPS/Fedex" ... yeah.
- safog 6y agoIt's been a pretty rough year for anyone trying to buy any sort of PC part this year (CPUs, GPUs even PSUs). Had to go stand in line to get one of the 3060 Tis like it was an Apple launch or something.
- 542458 6y agoOn the flip side, RAM prices are good and SSD prices are amazing. But yeah, CPUs and GPUs are a gongshow. A lot of people are blaming scalpers, but I think it’s just demand is much greater than supply.
- zymhan 6y agoI'm honestly amazed at the PC component market for the past decade. The Thailand flooding that messed up HDD production, and crypto mining jacking up the price of GPUs, are just two examples
- ethbr0 6y agoSecond order effects of increasing centralization in pursuit of manufacturing efficiency. It saves money to have everything co-located. It also amplifies the magnitude of physical-world disruptions.
- throwaway2048 6y agomore efficient usually means more fragile
- lotsofpulp 6y agoThe existence of scalpers implies demand outstripping than supply, so it’s the same thing.
- gowld 6y agoScalpers restrict supply by cornering the maket.
- NikolaeVarius 6y agoAbout 4 months too late on this. Apparently I will receive my 3070 at the end of January. Also took 2 months to find a Zen 3 CPU. Bought a 5800x simply because it was the only thing I could find.
- Rapzid 6y agoI picked a poor time to decide to upgrade after putting it off a year.. Great product cycle from a feature standpoint, terrible for stock. Don't believe I'll get either a 5xxx or 6xxx before the new year. Bought a 3950x just to have something in the meantime.
- m1gu3l 6y agoSounds like you are doing okay, that 3950x is pretty great and will re-sell for a decent amount on the second hand market. Good luck with your upgrades!
- avgDev 6y agoI was lucky that Microcenter has a unofficial discord channel. I followed that and was ready to go pick up parts anytime. I was able to snatch a 5900x two weeks ago and then 3070 yesterday. I have tried online but cannot beat the bots. I would have to write my own.
- 11thEarlOfMar 6y agoChip fabricators are planning 2 years of record spending on capital equipment and fabrication facilities[0]. Note that when a new 'fab' is built, the spend is on the order of $10 Billion. Also note that 85% of the world's capital spend on chip fabs is in Korea, China, Taiwan and Japan. Hence, 85% of the world chips are fabricated in that region. Notably, the bulk of the equipment that is purchased is made by US firms (about 1/2), with 1/4 from Europe and 1/4 from Japan. [0] www.semi.org/en/news-media-press/semi-press-releases/semiconductor-equipment-2020-year-end-forecast
- DoofusOfDeath 6y ago> note that 85% of the world's capital spend on chip fabs is in Korea, China, Taiwan and Japan. Hence, 85% of the world chips are fabricated in that region. I don't follow the logic. Why would the first 85% imply the second 85%?
- 11thEarlOfMar 6y agoThat's true, it really doesn't immediately mean that. Over time, should the regional spend patterns persist, it would in fact mean that in dollar terms. Edit: Perhaps should have said 'will be'. It's difficult to nail down the breakout of production regionally, because, for example, the US has 85% of the global semiconductor sales, but only 44% of that 85% are fabricated in the US. Here is the 2019 breakdown from Semiconductor International Association[0]. In unit terms, it could be quite different since there are so many low-value chips made on legacy equipment that has been depreciated. [0] https://www.semiconductors.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/2019-SIA-Factbook-FINAL.pdf https://www.semiconductors.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/20...
- winter_blue 6y ago> because, for example, the US has 85% of the global semiconductor sales This is incorrect. I looked at the PDF that you had linked to[0], and it says, on page 14 (of the PDF) that the total sales in the Americas is 22% of global sales. They say "Americas", so that includes Canada, Mexico, Central, and South America. The Asia Pacific region is where 60.3% of all semiconductors are sold to. And China is the largest consumer of semiconductors, at 33.8%. [0] https://www.semiconductors.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/2019-SIA-Factbook-FINAL.pdf https://www.semiconductors.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/20... (under Section 2: Global Market, on page 15 of the PDF / page 11 of the numbering scheme they use)
- leecb 6y agoSite appears down- is there a mirror? Page says "Something went wrong."
- AnimalMuppet 6y agoI saw that repeatedly from Reuters last week. This week seemed to work. This page worked for me today the one time I tried it.
- Thaxll 6y agoyes where is my RTX 3080...
- ksec 6y ago>More fundamentally, however, there has been under-investment in 8-inch chip manufacturing plants owned mostly by Asian firms, 8-inch or more commonly known as 200mm Wafers even in the US, are NOT under-invested. The total Wafer capacity of 200mm has been steadily increasing for a few years. ( I mean Reuters / Bloomberg reported this at the time, although fairly late in the cycle ). You cant have a perfect Supply and Demand cycles, there will never be one. And especially during uncertainties.
- ooboe 6y agoGlobal Foundries had capital issues and decided to pull the plug on their 7nm process in 2018. I wonder if they regret that now.
- willis936 6y agoBetting against semiconductor growth feels akin to betting that the apocalypse is about to happen: you can do it, but you lose either way.
- Osiris 6y agoI'm surprised that industry hasn't diversified the geographical locations of important manufacturing like this especially after the great hard drive shortage of 2011 after flooding crippled most hard drive manufacturing.
- 1-6 6y agoI think the efficiencies of manufacturing in one country still outweighs the benefits of diversification. I'm not an expert on these matters but it just seems obvious. You'll have to move around materials and there are trade/geopolitical issues at play there. Japan and Korea briefly had a dispute in 2019 and Japan stopped 3 chemicals from going to Korea. This affected their semi production.
- Osiris 6y agoThat's my point is that it's so concentrated it takes very little to completely disrupt the entire industry. The question to me is are the increased costs of diversification worth the risk of temporary (or maybe permanent) disruptions to manufacturing. Then again, when I studied political science and economics there was a common belief/theory that this sort of increased interdependency between countries (globalization) would decrease the likelihood of war and increase opportunities for democracy. So maybe it's a good thing.
- 1-6 6y agoIn my opinion, under ideal circumstances will you have interdependency between countries with everyone sharing a part in the process. What will end up happening is that countries will split into two ideological ‘nations’ like in Axis vs Allies.
- Dirlewanger 6y agoObviously not much has changed because SEA is where the cheap labor is, and it's not too far from China since many rare-earth materials are from there. I wonder if in the coming decades, as SEA's middle class continues to grow (as China's has now), we'll see companies migrate to Africa, the last frontier of relatively cheap labor. We know China has already begun doing that.
- intrasight 6y agoHave to add that people are waiting till 6/2021 - 9/2021 for their new bicycles. Lots of supply chain disruptions.
- tonyedgecombe 6y agoI had to wait two months just to get some replacement tyres. Similar for a freewheel hub.
- intrasight 6y agoI got a flat this summer. Brought my bike in to my local shop to have them fix it. They said "I hope you have a spare because we don't have tires, and it may be two months before we get any". I did have my spare that I had brought in with me. And I felt good about giving the shop some service works because I noticed right away that they had almost no bikes in stock.
- Arete314159 6y agoPhew, when I saw "global chip shortage" I was afraid for chocolate chips, but it's just computers.
- rgoddard 6y agoWhen my 5 year old was recently asked what was his favorite chip, his response was "chocolate chip". So that shortage may be just around the corner.
- imhoguy 6y agoOn the other hand this year I felt joy of restoring some 13+ years old laptop computers for school as donation. Amazing how cheap new 120GB SSD plus used 4GB RAM upgrade let them run modern OS, the Internet and edu software nicely. There is abundance of second-hand parts on ebay ready for delivery.
- INTPenis 6y agoWhat OS do they run?
- Spooky23 6y agoDon't know what the OP was doing, but schools operate with different rules for licensing. Some scenarios that aren't possible for individuals or enterprise are possible for schools, depending on the agreements in place.
- SaltySolomon 6y agoMostly likely Windows because most education software is written for it and most education places get it basically for free.
- imhoguy 6y agoMostly Windows 10 - supports even 32-bit CoreDuo, all edu software works, staff knows it. In EU you can buy second-hand software licenses legally. Some schools participate in volume licensing schemes with MS too. But I also install Ubuntu on some specialized "workstations", e.g. pendrive/Internet terminal laptop connected to beefy old laser copier/printer where CUPS PCL works with zero drivers. Other use case: jukebox laptop for music classes :)
- bserge 6y agoOh boy do I love all the used stuff, that's all I've been buying for the past decade with some rare exceptions like monitors and storage drives :D
- imhoguy 6y ago
- ddevault 6y agoVast numbers of perfectly servicable computer hardware is thrown out all the time. We would be well served to use this time to get used to reusing and extending the life of the hardware we already have. And, as software engineers, we need to reign in our reckless disregard for performance concerns to ensure that hardware remains useful, longer.
- astrange 6y agoPerformance may be improved purely in software (I don’t think this is true) but to improve power use you definitely want to keep throwing out old hardware. We’re not at the end of process shrinks yet and old stuff always uses more power.
- 43920 6y agoI would imagine the extra power use probably isn't enough to outweigh the environmental costs of manufacturing new hardware, at least for your average consumer device. For servers, maybe the higher power usage is sufficiently high for it to be beneficial?
- astrange 6y agoYes, I meant at datacenter scale. In your own house the power bill/the environment won't really be helped, but newer tech does have better battery life, and that's always nice.
- zepto 6y agoWhen you say ‘perfectly serviceable” what do you mean? Generally, I take it to mean still runs old sofware, but not compatible with current software.
- ddevault 6y agoI mean "capable of running useful software". There are vanishingly few use-cases which actually demand the resources of newer computers - 99% of software with high system requirements is due to programmers who have grown fat on the teat of their high-end workstations.
- temptemptemp111 6y agoCommon... Let's see some inefficient at-home chip fabs that are competitive!
- syntaxing 6y agoNot too surprised. The semiconductor industry have been dominating and buying up all the OEM equipment and hardware. Just get a quote from THK and be appalled at the lead time. The semi industry is extremely cyclical and fairly predictable. But this 5 years have really changed this. It is interesting that the downcycle for the industry never came this time AND it's booming greater than ever. Unfortunately it takes almost 5 years to ramp up the equipment to meet this new demand.
- sulam 6y agoThe fire in Japan is kind of a big deal. They turn out to have been the only supplier for that part and the result is that a ton of downstream manufacturers are affected. Your GCM team may have thought they had second sources, but when they're all dependent on a part from this one factory you see them all pull back their supply forecasts at the same time. It's been a trial.
- NonEUCitizen 6y agoWhat fire?
- sulam 6y agoThe article references it, but I can’t really go into more detail (contractually, that is).
- dmix 6y ago> U.S. sanctions-hit Chinese tech giant Huawei Technologies, a fire at a chip plant in Japan, coronavirus lockdowns in Southeast Asia, and a strike in France. It’s always a strike in France. Unionists dream state.
- spoopyskelly 6y agoIt's doubtful that France could ever impact chip production, unless you mean some sort of chocolate chip cookie.
- soheil 6y agoCorrect me if I'm wrong but isn't Apple one of the top users of chips and had their new M1 laptops and iPhone 12 shipped without a hiccup this year?
- burnthrow 6y agoYes it's another advantage for Apple.
- spoopyskelly 6y agoKnowing how to run your supply chain is an advantage.
- Seanambers 6y agoThey basically bought out the entire 5mm run at TSMC. https://www.extremetech.com/computing/315186-apple-books-tsmcs-entire-5nm-production-capability https://www.extremetech.com/computing/315186-apple-books-tsm...
- NonEUCitizen 6y ago5nm
- person_of_color 6y agoWill we ever run out of raw materials for Silicon?