Chip shortage leads carmaker Opel to shut German plant until 2022

Post by Smashure » Fri, Oct 01, 2021, 3:03 AM UTC

chrischen wrote: post #182

blackguardx wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Tesla dropped radar because they are moving to vision only systems like how the Comma AI/OpenPilot works. Vision models are superior to radar since radar can't detect stopped obstacles.

Post by Smashure » Fri, Oct 01, 2021, 3:07 AM UTC

Gunax wrote: post #177

slownews45 wrote: post #7

Man - the magnitude / impact of these chips shortages on autos in particular is crazy. Regardless of Opel popularity, in the US the F-150 was a best selling vehicle and massive cash cow and they had unfinished vehicles sitting out. These chips have GOT to be a relatively low margin / somewhat lower cost item (ie, feature size can be large). What a miss not to have more coverage for them.

After a train crash destroyed a few dozen Ford trucks, they sent an engineer who was also handy to pry the chips out of the smashed trucks. They were hand delivered back to the factory. Normally this would be ridiculous--there are many other parts that were probably more valuable. But now we have people cracking open smashed vehicles like walnuts so they can extract a chip nominally worth a few dollars.

Post by jandrese » Fri, Oct 01, 2021, 3:12 AM UTC

TedDoesntTalk wrote: post #255

beebeepka wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's the right question. As Huang said a few years ago: the more you buy, the more you save

In concert ticket sales, scalpers get preferential treatment because: 1. nepotism: they know someone who works at or owns part of the venue, or the performer, or the performer's manager, etc 2. they reliably buy in bulk 3. corruption: they pay off someone on the inside. so which is it here?

Post by QuarterReptile » Fri, Oct 01, 2021, 3:18 AM UTC

pitaj wrote: post #336

spectramax wrote: post #326

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Absolutely not. “Sharing resources” doesn’t work when there is not enough to share. A civilized society works when supply and demand intersection determines the price of goods and services. Governments should interfere for specific cases (life emergency, masks, etc) and there are laws prohibiting scalping for these commodities - rightfully so. Your idea of government intervention would assume that government is a rat…

Laws prohibiting "scalping" or "price gouging" in emergencies often makes problems worse by incentivizing hoarding and disincentivizing more suppliers from entering the market.

Post by Lord_Baltimore » Fri, Oct 01, 2021, 3:37 AM UTC

dapids wrote: post #301

yholio wrote: post #282

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Scalpers perform a social service by rationing demand and ensuring availability. They don't eat the whole consumer surplus, rather, they must compete amongst themselves and the price you pay is the amount that makes client N+1 walk away if total supply is N. Some of the buyers will find that close to their margin, but others, for which the product is essential in very valuable (thus socially useful) goods or services…

> "Scalpers perform a social service" Good luck finding anyone willing to recognize this absurd point. > "the problem is low competition" Tell that to the GPU market.