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Most auto companies don't take delivery of chips except for managing production of a few key modules like engine controllers. Most of the chips in your car are
by phkahler 5y ago
Most auto companies don't take delivery of chips except for managing production of a few key modules like engine controllers. Most of the chips in your car are in components made by suppliers with circuit boards often made by a second tier supplier. Combine that with many chips having no alternate and I don't see how Toyota could really stay exempt from this problem. OTOH not every chip maker is having trouble keeping up.
- lostapathy 5y agoToyota doesn't have to physically hold the chips/modules to accomplish they. They have contracts with suppliers that lock in how much inventory the supplier has to have on hand, and how much supply they need locked in from their own upstream suppliers. One criticism of Toyota's production system is that they aren't so much "just in time" as it sounds on the surface, rather they just force their suppliers to run the warehouse instead of them. Which still makes sense - Toyota wants to be in the car business, not the warehouse and logistics businesses.
- bluGill 5y agoToyota is in the logistics business more than the car business. Sure cars make the money, but the logistics are the hard part of a large car factory.
- lostapathy 5y agoIn that way - one could argue they "manage the logistics business" - but that they don't actually want to do the logistics (or own the inventory/warehouses).