Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Semiconductors Demand 30% Above Supply, 20% Year-on-Year Growth

anandtech.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 170 posts

Re: Semiconductors Demand 30% Above Supply, 20% Year-on-Year Growth

#41

Post by ppf »

simias wrote: post #29
ppf wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's just a handy reference for energy usage, and I assume this figure is more readily available due to the car being battery powered. It's a bit harder to work out for an ICE-powered car, as you'd have to calculate the energy required to move the car based on aerodynamics and weight. I have no interest in TSLA stock, nor do I think Tesla is anything like the sustainable future of transportation. I mostly picked Tels…

You can do exactly the same back-of-the-envelope calculation for ICE engines as you did for the Tesla, you just need to know the average fuel consumption per mile and the energy density of gasoline. No need to worry about areodynamics.

I was using that number to represent just the energy required to motivate the car, and assuming that an EV has near-perfect energy translation from battery to movement (and therefore providing an accurate enough representation of that energy). It gets a little complicated if you want to consider the fuel input, as you start getting into wells-to-wheels calculations. Depending on your power grid energy mix, it also makes things quite a bit worse for EVs.

Re: Semiconductors Demand 30% Above Supply, 20% Year-on-Year Growth

#42

Post by totalZero »

scott_codie wrote: post #28
UncleOxidant wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm saying that the Chinese government has determined that semiconductors are strategically important and is willing to pour yuan into fabs and developing their own process equipment industry. Semiconductor manufacturing is a very capital intensive business and the short-term market view in the West isn't well suited to remaining competitive in that space. Silicon Valley has very little to do with silicon anymore bec…

Thats great for them and great for US semiconductor companies since we are trading partners.

No. Dependence upon East Asian semi fabrication is a liability even if you're best buddies (as with Taiwan). TSMC was founded by Morris Chang -- hard to find a more reasonable, US-friendly, capitalist person in the industry -- but every time a butterfly flaps its wings in Asia-Pacific, we have to worry about the sanctity and continuity of our semiconductor supply chain.

NVDA just reported earnings and, while booming, it was not the blowout that you'd expect in the context of the greater demand picture for their products. That's in an environment where you don't have open multinational warfare in Asia-Pacific and their manufacturing partner TSMC is firing on almost all cylinders (water shortage excepted).

Fabs in the US and elsewhere in the Americas are more defensible in times of war, and more likely to prioritize demand from US companies when supply tightens.

Re: Semiconductors Demand 30% Above Supply, 20% Year-on-Year Growth

#43

Post by cma »

ppf wrote: post #10
thewarrior wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good thing we aren’t doing anything to destabilize a climate system that’s not causing us too much trouble as of now.

You mean, like manufacturing electronics? It takes about 1MWh to manufacture a laptop, the same energy needed to drive a Tesla for 3000 miles. https://www.networkworld.com/article/2229029/computer-factor...

Did you account for how much energy to create the Tesla as well?

Re: Semiconductors Demand 30% Above Supply, 20% Year-on-Year Growth

#44

Post by TrispusAttucks »

HenryKissinger wrote: post #39
stupidcar wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The DoD's Industrial Capabilities report to Congress[1] that got posted on HN last week recommended exactly this: > "Outside of the United States, foreign governments and their citizens pay the lion’s share, one way or another, of the cost of building the fab. The companies do not. They take on the other massive set of costs: running the fab. The hard truth is that if the United States does not start doing the same,…

The Chinese government is willing to spend what it takes to win and this is the reason why they will win. The US government is way too reluctant to spend in this regard. The Chinese government is investing hundreds of billions in artificial intelligence, hundreds of billions more in renewables, and so on. I don't see Congress giving a blank check to scientists and engineers, like China does.

Here in the USA we're more focused on the important things, like passing identity politics legislation.

Re: Semiconductors Demand 30% Above Supply, 20% Year-on-Year Growth

#45

Post by totalZero »

scott_codie wrote: post #25
UncleOxidant wrote: post #17

Given the strategic importance of semiconductors and how expensive new fabs are and how long they take to start production (if you start planning a new state of the art fab now it'll take ~5 years before it's ready to produce chips) it seems like perhaps we need to look a public-private partnerships here in the US. The Chinese government is funding fabs. While we tend to be squeamish about such things here in the US,…

Are you saying that Chinese semiconductor companies are outcompeting US semiconductor companies because they have greater access to capital? That doesn't seem right to me.

It is right.

US public companies are judged by the efficiency and timeframe of their returns on capital, which means that big long-term projects have to be carefully planned and justified.

That's not the case when the government gets involved. We've already seen China build a lot of other infrastructure for no reason. Highways, skyscrapers...

Additionally, Chinese companies operate in an environment where it's OK to steal foreign IP as long as the Chinese government approves of your business activity. So it's not just capital that the government uses to fertilize growth in its corporate nursery.

Re: Semiconductors Demand 30% Above Supply, 20% Year-on-Year Growth

#46

Post by bsder »

A lot of this is people now over-ordering since they can get stuck by a shortfall. As soon as the crunch passes, there will be a big drop in demand while people burn down their inventory.

Normally, planning is 18-26 weeks out and nobody really worries.

Now, planning is 52+ weeks out, and people are stockpiling.

Re: Semiconductors Demand 30% Above Supply, 20% Year-on-Year Growth

#47

Post by bsder »

the__alchemist wrote: post #4

I'm having a tough time buying STM32 MCUs. When I started my most recent designs about 6 months ago, the SMT-assembly service I used, and retailers like Digikey and Mouser had ample stock. Now, I'm unable to start production due to being unable to find MCUs. The whole STM32 line is affected - Only a handful of variants are available, which may or may not be the ones a given design can use.

Surprising. ST runs their own fabs.

People must be stockpiling, and ST is replenishing the most profitable stuff first.

Re: Semiconductors Demand 30% Above Supply, 20% Year-on-Year Growth

#48

Post by Udik »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #36
scott_codie wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you saying that Chinese semiconductor companies are outcompeting US semiconductor companies because they have greater access to capital? That doesn't seem right to me.

> Are you saying that Chinese semiconductor companies are outcompeting US semiconductor companies because they have greater access to capital? That doesn't seem right to me. Suppose you have two companies in an industry where the start up cost is ten billion dollars. One can borrow ten billion dollars at 0% interest for the next five years, but they have to pay it back. The other just gets ten billion dollars from th…

Isn't that equivalent to starting up with VC money (and stocks, later)? You get billions to start up, and if you fail you don't have to pay anything back. It's the business model of Amazon, Uber, Tesla, Airbnb...

Re: Semiconductors Demand 30% Above Supply, 20% Year-on-Year Growth

#49

Post by madengr »

TrispusAttucks wrote: post #44
HenryKissinger wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Chinese government is willing to spend what it takes to win and this is the reason why they will win. The US government is way too reluctant to spend in this regard. The Chinese government is investing hundreds of billions in artificial intelligence, hundreds of billions more in renewables, and so on. I don't see Congress giving a blank check to scientists and engineers, like China does.

Here in the USA we're more focused on the important things, like passing identity politics legislation.

Yep, I work in hardware design for defense. They dropped the Cadence license (no RFIC design for me), but I got to take Unconscious Bias training yesterday.

Re: Semiconductors Demand 30% Above Supply, 20% Year-on-Year Growth

#50

Post by refulgentis »

syntaxing wrote: post #31
11thEarlOfMar wrote: post #3

Equipment companies are running at an all-out sprint to ship fabrication equipment. Applied Materials, the world's largest by revenue, has 1,390 open positions. #4 Lam Research has 570. The equipment space is brutally cyclic, akin to the oil services industry. Revenue can jump as much as 60% year over year, only to plummet 40% the next. It's always worrisome to see these macro-trends, feasting now, but famine sure to…

I think this is the problem. The downcycle for the semi industry should of came around 2-3 years ago. The issue is that never came and the industry is growing at an even more ridiculous rate. The semi industry is single handed buying a good chunk of the OEM equipment space these past 3 years. Just get a THK rail quote and look at awe at the one year+ lead time.

This plus secular trends due to the shortage _itself_ inducing further future plant development at home, simply for redundancy as a hedge against tail risk...think we're closer to the start of a 5-10 year boom than the end
Post reply on HN