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>Hyundai Group is pushing for internal chip production HAHA, good luck even coming close to specification of Infineon parts. >LACK OF ALTERNATIVES no shit Sh

by rasz 4y ago

>Hyundai Group is pushing for internal chip production HAHA, good luck even coming close to specification of Infineon parts. >LACK OF ALTERNATIVES no shit Sherlock, this is life on the bleeding edge >It is also trying to shorten the delivery time by transporting chips from global semiconductor makers by air. you mean they used ocean freight on tiny light components (maybe hundred kg per 10K cars) to cut costs? :) >Infineon accounts for 12.7% of global automotive chip output, trailed by the Netherlands-based NXP and Japan’s Renesas with 11.8% and 8.4%, respectively. automotive, but not EV. Afaik NXP makes zero IGBTs, they make gate drivers. Renesas makes some, but their EV grade parts were supposed to start shipping in 2021 and didnt https://www.renesas.com/us/en/products/automotive-products/automotive-power-devices/automotive-igbt-0 https://www.renesas.com/us/en/products/automotive-products/a...

ChuckNorris89 4y ago
On point. Hyundai can bitch and posture all they want but those chips aren't some commodity parts they can multi source or make themselves not matter how much money they throw at the problem. You can't bring up decades of analog microelectronics design experience overnight. So they have to deal with whatever issues Infineon has. It's part of the risks of being on the bleeding edge. That's why even luxury German car companies usually stay on older tech.
- lnsru 4y ago
  Power semiconductors aren’t the most bleeding edge. SiC technology is a recent game changer leveling all market players to the same tech level. IFX advantage with silicon is gone. The structures are big and Hyundai-Kia conglomerate can afford their own production for sure. They also have Samsung there. And they know their requirements best and can optimize for them instead of buying off-shelf parts from IFX. German premium manufacturers also don’t use 800V system with fast charging while Hyundai-Kia does.
  - ChuckNorris89 4y ago
    Samsung doesn't design cutting edge analog chips. Just because they fab NAND, DRAM, and cutting edge logic chips, don't mean they can switch to high performance analog chips on a whim. There's a reason, Infineon, TI, Vichay, and other's are still highly profitable.
    - packetlost 4y ago
      Are the physics and manufacturing of analog vs digital components really so different that there's no applicable knowledge transfer? I would be surprised to learn that.
      - jjoonathan 4y ago
        Well, there's more transfer than nothing, but the hard parts of digital (sophisticated logic, absurd per-gate reliability, low feature sizes) just don't overlap much with the hard parts of analog, which is all about device physics and materials. Sure, the people who design logic transistors would probably adapt quickly to designing power transistors, but they are a very small part of a very large machine. For example: a digital organization may have learned through harsh and repeated lessons 100 subtle ways to be more conservative about device changes. FinFETs took 15 years to go from R&D to prod, for example. While this level of risk aversion might be critical for shipping billion-transistor devices, it may be maladaptive for shipping single transistors, where a 15 year deployment leaves you 10 years behind your competition. Likewise, the processes (patterning, etching, implantation, etc) are largely similar, but the digital side has made colossal investments optimizing for things that just don't matter as much for analog design. The famed EUV machines? What does a power transistor gain from tiny features? I'd be surprised if they were useful, let alone useful enough to justify the cost, let alone useful enough to justify the cost and the risk of repurposing a machine for process innovation. Like using a F1 car to commute to work -- even if cost were no object, extreme optimization for one purpose makes it worse at others.
        R0b0t1 4y ago
        Power electronics gain surface area from small feature sizes, allowing the electrons to diffuse more efficiently seen as lower loss and higher switching frequencies. Same with gate design.
  - f001 4y ago
    Audi/Porsche do use 800v systems with fast charging: https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a28903284/porsche-taycan-ev-800-volt-charging-performance/ https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a28903284/porsche-taycan-e...
  - phkahler 4y ago
    >> Power semiconductors aren’t the most bleeding edge. SiC technology is a recent game changer leveling all market players to the same tech level. IGBTs are not quite a commodity at highest specs, and power modules are yet another years-long development. Infineon has been building modules with high power density for decades and that experience will also carry over to SiC chips. Where I'm at we are building our own SiC "modules" from discrete components for now and these are much larger than Infineon power modules - but we are air cooled ;-) It seems like there should be a standard form factor for 3-phase power modules by now. That would make them easy to replace even if you have different specs.
  - rasz 4y ago
    >German premium manufacturers also don’t use 800V Taycan uses cree sic, bleeding edge. GM signed up for those too.
ZeroGravitas 4y ago
If you have a consistent supply of something then a slow but lower cost delivery method is entirely sensible, as is switching to higher cost but faster methods when there have been interruptions. The story also mentions that their internal plans are for lower spec items.
- moooo99 4y ago
  > If you have a consistent supply of something then a slow but lower cost delivery method is entirely sensible, as is switching to higher cost but faster methods when there have been interruptions. It might make sense from an economical point of view, but not from a resilience point of view. Ignoring the chip shortages over the last two years, there have been major disruptions in ocean freight logistics. Given the relatively high value density and the crucial role of these components in the vehicle manufacturing process, making air-freight the default would have been a sensible choice as well. Despite the feasibility of alternatives
  - ZeroGravitas 4y ago
    The problem isn't that a ship got delayed with the chips on board, they threw out months of production at the factory due to a flaw before shipping them. So switching to air freight now is just boring and sensible (and would also work if a ship got delayed too, meaning the cheaper option is basically risk free).
- snewman 4y ago
  Even with consistent supply, for a high value low weight item, ocean shipping does not make sense simply from a time value of money perspective. Also, it makes planning that much more difficult, you have to adjust orders that much farther in advance.
  - smachiz 4y ago
    Not really true - depending on volume. In almost all certainty they have volume commitments out months - and have for at least two years. JIT stopped being a reality a while ago. If you know you're sitting on 2 months of inventory, and you're getting shipments that are equal to 1 month of capacity every month, and it takes 3-5 weeks by sea, it's a perfectly reasonable thing to do still. Also, depending on their contracts, they may not pay the vendor until they receive the goods at their location, so the sea freight shipment doesn't have a cost for time value of money. If you're sitting on a buffer, time value of money doesn't matter - and only gets worse by spending more money to get it sooner if you can only produce say 5k cars/week - doesn't matter if you get parts sooner you can't use.
bob1029 4y ago
> good luck even coming close to specification of Infineon parts. You don't have to meet or beat the vendor's expectations when you have the ability to build them in any manner you deem fit. Vertical integration shouldn't be about a direct 1:1 replacement of your vendors. It should be a 2-way street wherein your requirements adjust relative to your revised ambitions. In-house design cycles can allow cheaper and more rapid development so a lot of other levers become available to pull. Also, power ICs aren't exactly requiring EUV tools, multi-patterning and other bleeding-edge manufacturing knowledge.
- rcxdude 4y ago
  Oower ICs require a mostly seperate form of bleeding-edge manufacturing knowledge. Power electronics has been improving immensely over the last few decades, in large part due to such advances.
throwawayhyund 4y ago
> you mean they used ocean freight on tiny light components (maybe hundred kg per 10K cars) to cut costs? :) No… they used ocean freight because that’s how you ship assembled shit from China. This whole chip shortage thing is bullshit, it has nothing to do with the chips themselves, and everything to do with the cheap labor assembling hundreds of parts - many of them chips and electronics, but also not - into a single “part” to dodge import restrictions around how much of a car is made “foreign.” It’s insane how hard this is to communicate to people and how hard they’ve bought into the absolute bullshit.

by rasz 4y ago

ChuckNorris89 4y ago

On point. Hyundai can bitch and posture all they want but those chips aren't some commodity parts they can multi source or make themselves not matter how much money they throw at the problem. You can't bring up decades of analog microelectronics design experience overnight. So they have to deal with whatever issues Infineon has. It's part of the risks of being on the bleeding edge. That's why even luxury German car companies usually stay on older tech.

lnsru 4y ago
Power semiconductors aren’t the most bleeding edge. SiC technology is a recent game changer leveling all market players to the same tech level. IFX advantage with silicon is gone. The structures are big and Hyundai-Kia conglomerate can afford their own production for sure. They also have Samsung there. And they know their requirements best and can optimize for them instead of buying off-shelf parts from IFX. German premium manufacturers also don’t use 800V system with fast charging while Hyundai-Kia does.
- ChuckNorris89 4y ago
  Samsung doesn't design cutting edge analog chips. Just because they fab NAND, DRAM, and cutting edge logic chips, don't mean they can switch to high performance analog chips on a whim. There's a reason, Infineon, TI, Vichay, and other's are still highly profitable.
  - packetlost 4y ago
    Are the physics and manufacturing of analog vs digital components really so different that there's no applicable knowledge transfer? I would be surprised to learn that.
    - jjoonathan 4y ago
      Well, there's more transfer than nothing, but the hard parts of digital (sophisticated logic, absurd per-gate reliability, low feature sizes) just don't overlap much with the hard parts of analog, which is all about device physics and materials. Sure, the people who design logic transistors would probably adapt quickly to designing power transistors, but they are a very small part of a very large machine. For example: a digital organization may have learned through harsh and repeated lessons 100 subtle ways to be more conservative about device changes. FinFETs took 15 years to go from R&D to prod, for example. While this level of risk aversion might be critical for shipping billion-transistor devices, it may be maladaptive for shipping single transistors, where a 15 year deployment leaves you 10 years behind your competition. Likewise, the processes (patterning, etching, implantation, etc) are largely similar, but the digital side has made colossal investments optimizing for things that just don't matter as much for analog design. The famed EUV machines? What does a power transistor gain from tiny features? I'd be surprised if they were useful, let alone useful enough to justify the cost, let alone useful enough to justify the cost and the risk of repurposing a machine for process innovation. Like using a F1 car to commute to work -- even if cost were no object, extreme optimization for one purpose makes it worse at others.
      - R0b0t1 4y ago
        Power electronics gain surface area from small feature sizes, allowing the electrons to diffuse more efficiently seen as lower loss and higher switching frequencies. Same with gate design.
- f001 4y ago
  Audi/Porsche do use 800v systems with fast charging: https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a28903284/porsche-taycan-ev-800-volt-charging-performance/ https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a28903284/porsche-taycan-e...
- phkahler 4y ago
  >> Power semiconductors aren’t the most bleeding edge. SiC technology is a recent game changer leveling all market players to the same tech level. IGBTs are not quite a commodity at highest specs, and power modules are yet another years-long development. Infineon has been building modules with high power density for decades and that experience will also carry over to SiC chips. Where I'm at we are building our own SiC "modules" from discrete components for now and these are much larger than Infineon power modules - but we are air cooled ;-) It seems like there should be a standard form factor for 3-phase power modules by now. That would make them easy to replace even if you have different specs.
- rasz 4y ago
  >German premium manufacturers also don’t use 800V Taycan uses cree sic, bleeding edge. GM signed up for those too.

ZeroGravitas 4y ago

If you have a consistent supply of something then a slow but lower cost delivery method is entirely sensible, as is switching to higher cost but faster methods when there have been interruptions. The story also mentions that their internal plans are for lower spec items.

moooo99 4y ago
> If you have a consistent supply of something then a slow but lower cost delivery method is entirely sensible, as is switching to higher cost but faster methods when there have been interruptions. It might make sense from an economical point of view, but not from a resilience point of view. Ignoring the chip shortages over the last two years, there have been major disruptions in ocean freight logistics. Given the relatively high value density and the crucial role of these components in the vehicle manufacturing process, making air-freight the default would have been a sensible choice as well. Despite the feasibility of alternatives
- ZeroGravitas 4y ago
  The problem isn't that a ship got delayed with the chips on board, they threw out months of production at the factory due to a flaw before shipping them. So switching to air freight now is just boring and sensible (and would also work if a ship got delayed too, meaning the cheaper option is basically risk free).
snewman 4y ago
Even with consistent supply, for a high value low weight item, ocean shipping does not make sense simply from a time value of money perspective. Also, it makes planning that much more difficult, you have to adjust orders that much farther in advance.
- smachiz 4y ago
  Not really true - depending on volume. In almost all certainty they have volume commitments out months - and have for at least two years. JIT stopped being a reality a while ago. If you know you're sitting on 2 months of inventory, and you're getting shipments that are equal to 1 month of capacity every month, and it takes 3-5 weeks by sea, it's a perfectly reasonable thing to do still. Also, depending on their contracts, they may not pay the vendor until they receive the goods at their location, so the sea freight shipment doesn't have a cost for time value of money. If you're sitting on a buffer, time value of money doesn't matter - and only gets worse by spending more money to get it sooner if you can only produce say 5k cars/week - doesn't matter if you get parts sooner you can't use.

bob1029 4y ago

> good luck even coming close to specification of Infineon parts. You don't have to meet or beat the vendor's expectations when you have the ability to build them in any manner you deem fit. Vertical integration shouldn't be about a direct 1:1 replacement of your vendors. It should be a 2-way street wherein your requirements adjust relative to your revised ambitions. In-house design cycles can allow cheaper and more rapid development so a lot of other levers become available to pull. Also, power ICs aren't exactly requiring EUV tools, multi-patterning and other bleeding-edge manufacturing knowledge.

rcxdude 4y ago
Oower ICs require a mostly seperate form of bleeding-edge manufacturing knowledge. Power electronics has been improving immensely over the last few decades, in large part due to such advances.

throwawayhyund 4y ago

> you mean they used ocean freight on tiny light components (maybe hundred kg per 10K cars) to cut costs? :) No… they used ocean freight because that’s how you ship assembled shit from China. This whole chip shortage thing is bullshit, it has nothing to do with the chips themselves, and everything to do with the cheap labor assembling hundreds of parts - many of them chips and electronics, but also not - into a single “part” to dodge import restrictions around how much of a car is made “foreign.” It’s insane how hard this is to communicate to people and how hard they’ve bought into the absolute bullshit.