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

Chip shortage leads carmaker Opel to shut German plant until 2022

reuters.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

151–160 of 495 posts

Re: Chip shortage leads carmaker Opel to shut German plant until 2022

#151

Post by Ekaros »

throwawayjava wrote: post #47
liamwire wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you’re vastly a) underestimating the time it takes to bring a new product line all the way into production in the auto industry, and b) overestimating the true demand for such a product, Hacker News and adjacent crowds notwithstanding – peoples broadly have come to expect those simple features at practically every price point, as evidenced by the ubiquity of said features in the market.

B in particular. Products like the Yaris compete on price alone.

And Yaris is already premium affordable car. Koreans are slightly below it and then cheap ones are India or specific models.

Re: Chip shortage leads carmaker Opel to shut German plant until 2022

#152

Post by Ekaros »

thriftwy wrote: post #103
windowsrookie wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the United States backup cameras, tire pressure monitors, and electronic stability control are required by law. So out of your list that leaves.. GPS (already optional on most cars) Ass warmers (already optional on most cars) Telemetry (this could be removed from models that have it, not all cars sold today have telemetry) USB chargers (really don't think USB chargers are causing a production shortage at this mome…

What's the point of keyless entry? Mine comes with key, and yhe auxiliary immobilizer which will not let it drive without radio tag or typing in PIN.

Ease of use. I would love if I could just leave key in my pocket and not worry about opening doors or putting it in ignition. I could even connect it to my keychain.

Re: Chip shortage leads carmaker Opel to shut German plant until 2022

#153

Post by chmod600 »

codazoda wrote: post #142
kbaker wrote: post #114

One important part of the chip shortage is the massive amount of price gouging going on. Every IC is being bought up by new 3rd party distributors to scalp to desperate electronics manufacturers. Take a look at this chip we are just now crossing as an example, click on 'Non-authorized stocking distributors': https://octopart.com/tps2052bdgnr-texas+instruments-699312?r... Win Source has a bunch, but you will pay 6x th…

I think this would be against the law in the U.S. (although probably hard to prosecute). After looking through a few of these, however, it looks like most of them are in other countries, so different laws apply.

Against what law? Isn't speculation pretty normal in a lot of markets?

Re: Chip shortage leads carmaker Opel to shut German plant until 2022

#154

Post by [deleted] »

blackguardx wrote: post #150
minhazm wrote: post #136

Tesla has done a decent job of mitigating some of the chip shortages since they are so vertically integrated. Though obviously Tesla produces way less cars than Toyota/Honda/VW. But other manufacturers simply can't do this even if they wanted to since they outsource most of this stuff. > “We were able to substitute alternative chips, and then write the firmware in a matter of weeks,” Musk said. “It’s not just a matte…

They also just completely dropped a feature - radar - because they couldn't get parts for it. I'm not sure other manufacturers would be able to do that either due to internal processes or being able to risk their reputation.

[deleted]

Re: Chip shortage leads carmaker Opel to shut German plant until 2022

#155

Post by Retric »

hutrdvnj wrote: post #137
kbaker wrote: post #114

One important part of the chip shortage is the massive amount of price gouging going on. Every IC is being bought up by new 3rd party distributors to scalp to desperate electronics manufacturers. Take a look at this chip we are just now crossing as an example, click on 'Non-authorized stocking distributors': https://octopart.com/tps2052bdgnr-texas+instruments-699312?r... Win Source has a bunch, but you will pay 6x th…

Scalpers are not the problem as they seem, they are like market makers for stock exchanges. They buy low and sell high, always. The factory could tell you that they're currently out of stock for the next few months, but a scalper will never be out of stock, because their prices rises so high that only very few desperate companies would buy. The point is, it's better to have the option to buy something at a high price…

They can only do that by holding onto to supply which makes shortages worse. The same thing happens with ticket scalping at concerts, the difference is it’s more obvious that a sold out concert has empty seats vs supply sitting in a warehouse on the off chance it can be sold at 100x prices.

Re: Chip shortage leads carmaker Opel to shut German plant until 2022

#156

Post by thriftwy »

Ekaros wrote: post #152
thriftwy wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's the point of keyless entry? Mine comes with key, and yhe auxiliary immobilizer which will not let it drive without radio tag or typing in PIN.

Ease of use. I would love if I could just leave key in my pocket and not worry about opening doors or putting it in ignition. I could even connect it to my keychain.

I wonder if nobody did ssh+nfc keys yet. At least I could trust it.

Re: Chip shortage leads carmaker Opel to shut German plant until 2022

#157

Post by PicassoCTs »

hutrdvnj wrote: post #137
kbaker wrote: post #114

One important part of the chip shortage is the massive amount of price gouging going on. Every IC is being bought up by new 3rd party distributors to scalp to desperate electronics manufacturers. Take a look at this chip we are just now crossing as an example, click on 'Non-authorized stocking distributors': https://octopart.com/tps2052bdgnr-texas+instruments-699312?r... Win Source has a bunch, but you will pay 6x th…

Scalpers are not the problem as they seem, they are like market makers for stock exchanges. They buy low and sell high, always. The factory could tell you that they're currently out of stock for the next few months, but a scalper will never be out of stock, because their prices rises so high that only very few desperate companies would buy. The point is, it's better to have the option to buy something at a high price…

Scalpers hedge on the fragility of just-in-time - they milk the short-term thinkers for all they saved in the good times and are thus a healthy part of the market.

Why do we praise people betting on actors being hurt by bad decisions like (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Burry) but condemn the same behavior on the smaller scale of physical products?

Re: Chip shortage leads carmaker Opel to shut German plant until 2022

#158

Post by teeray »

hristov wrote: post #71
caeril wrote: post #21

What I'll never understand is why carmakers don't take advantage of this situation and address a market that's been literally BEGGING for decades for a new product: A simple, basic car, with the ONLY electronic control being for: - Valve timing - Fuel injection - Oxygen and throttle - Emissions There's a market for budget and privacy oriented customers that all carmakers seem to have ignored for two decades now. Give…

First of all this "simple" car may end up being more expensive. Doing a lot of the things the old mechanical way requires a lot of labor and labor is expensive nowadays. Having to use turning wires and vacuum tubes for instrument clusters, and a bunch of pull wires for controls... Not only would that be expensive it would require skills and equipment long lost today. Oh and the wind shield wipers -- it is possible to…

> cars used to break down much more often and require much more skilled maintenance.

Yeah, but “skilled maintenance “ was an easy skill. There could only be a handful of things wrong if it didn’t start: e.g. no spark, no fuel. In the case of no spark, you check the plug, see if it’s dirty, change it if so; check the distributor, maybe the points are bad; check the coil or condenser… yeah there were things to check, but you could actually fix it once you learned about it. And yes, you could do this on the side of the road—there were “tool rolls” you could have for such purposes.

Now, you get a check engine light and the code reader says, in so many words: “bring to dealer and pay up”

Re: Chip shortage leads carmaker Opel to shut German plant until 2022

#159

Post by rsynnott »

dpe82 wrote: post #3
tibbydudeza wrote: post #2

They used to be big back in the day when hot hatches ruled and we had Golf vs Astra (Vauxhall for the UK) but then we got crossovers and mini-SUV and GM had their own problems to invest in the brand. Nowadays they make rebadged Peugeot/Citroen cars.

Are you suggesting the plant closure is due more to waning popularity of their cars rather than availability of parts?

Stellantis, the controlling company, is more or less an aggregation of all those car brands which makes you go "wait, _they're_ still in business?!", so, I mean, it's kind of plausible.

Re: Chip shortage leads carmaker Opel to shut German plant until 2022

#160

Post by the__alchemist »

hutrdvnj wrote: post #137
kbaker wrote: post #114

One important part of the chip shortage is the massive amount of price gouging going on. Every IC is being bought up by new 3rd party distributors to scalp to desperate electronics manufacturers. Take a look at this chip we are just now crossing as an example, click on 'Non-authorized stocking distributors': https://octopart.com/tps2052bdgnr-texas+instruments-699312?r... Win Source has a bunch, but you will pay 6x th…

Scalpers are not the problem as they seem, they are like market makers for stock exchanges. They buy low and sell high, always. The factory could tell you that they're currently out of stock for the next few months, but a scalper will never be out of stock, because their prices rises so high that only very few desperate companies would buy. The point is, it's better to have the option to buy something at a high price…

Negative. Like scalping everywhere, they're middlemen who contribute nothing to society, and make it more difficult for people who do.
Post reply on HN