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Chip shortage leads carmaker Opel to shut German plant until 2022

reuters.com

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

#161

Post by 10000truths »

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…

It depends on what is causing the lack of supply. If the bottleneck lies in factors beyond the control of consumers, i.e. discontinued production, or shortage of raw material, then I see no inherent issue with scalping. But if it’s the scalpers themselves that cause an otherwise plentiful supply to become scarce, then they are the cause of the shortage, rather than the effect, and their behavior should be curbed. The problem is that the former situation can easily lead to the latter via a panic buying feedback loop, and it’s not entirely clear where the distinction should be drawn.

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

#162

Post by Ekaros »

thriftwy wrote: post #156
Ekaros wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

SSH+NFC sound like horrible protocol choice for such token.

Not that I would be against option to periodically rekey the whole system. Generate new pair of private keys and have the car and key swap them with my approval.

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

#163

Post by da_chicken »

whiteboardr wrote: post #4

@kliment summarized the why pretty well: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26931498 Curious if this is true for all manufacturers.

The "religious reasons" he's talking about are "zero inventory" or "JIT inventory" pioneered by Japanese auto makers in the 80s and 90s. By optimizing inventory management and understanding demand for your product, you can ensure you don't have excess inventory on-site (meaning you don't have money invested in product parts you can't sell and have to pay taxes on). It's the system that virtually every manufacturer (auto or otherwise) uses now.

It's why major supply chain issues cause catastrophic manufacturing problems.

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

#164

Post by m4rtink »

PicassoCTs wrote: post #157
hutrdvnj wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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?

Would they not harm also reguar manufacturers who just want to make a stock of some part before starting a manufacturing run ?

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

#165

Post by mrweasel »

megablast wrote: post #141
mrweasel wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hate tire pressure sensors, they are amazingly flaky and makes you uneasy about driving. That and the stupid alarms in my car that informs me that the temperature is below 4 degrees, it disturbs my driving.

You should be uneasy about driving. For most people, it’s the most dangerous thing you will do today. If you are going to kill someone, it’s with your car.

But I don’t need flaky sensors alert me of no existing problem. That just makes everything worse.

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

#166

Post by FartyMcFarter »

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.

Indeed - not many manufacturers could get away with Tesla's strategy of charging money for features that are in Alpha state, to put it charitably (e.g. Autopilot).

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

#167

Post by the__alchemist »

PicassoCTs wrote: post #157
hutrdvnj wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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?

Scalpers hurt anyone launching a hardware product who doesn't have the order quantity to buy direct-from-manufacturer.

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

#168

Post by ajmurmann »

chmod600 wrote: post #153
codazoda wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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?

There are laws against price gouging. I believe those only apply during emergencies.

Personally, I believe it's manufacturers not asking for the price the market is willing to pay and scalpers taking advantage of that. Charging real prices also can prevent hording in certain emergencies.

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

#169

Post by j-bos »

da_chicken wrote: post #163
whiteboardr wrote: post #4

@kliment summarized the why pretty well: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26931498 Curious if this is true for all manufacturers.

The "religious reasons" he's talking about are "zero inventory" or "JIT inventory" pioneered by Japanese auto makers in the 80s and 90s. By optimizing inventory management and understanding demand for your product, you can ensure you don't have excess inventory on-site (meaning you don't have money invested in product parts you can't sell and have to pay taxes on). It's the system that virtually every manufacturer (a…

My understanding is that JIT, as performed by Toyota, takes into account the differences in difficulty of sourcing different inventories. If this is true, one would expect that Toyota faced shortages later than other manufacturers. Does anyone have a source proving or disproving this?

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

#170

Post by ladyattis »

whiteboardr wrote: post #4

@kliment summarized the why pretty well: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26931498 Curious if this is true for all manufacturers.

I know that even SMD transistors got hit hard by the automaker component switch-a-roo. It's not too easy to find RF transistors even for signal amp work like I do for a hobby. It's just a disaster right now.
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