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

A big hurdle to fixing the chip shortage: substrates

wsj.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

61–70 of 136 posts

Re: A big hurdle to fixing the chip shortage: substrates

#61

Post by VortexDream »

cptskippy wrote: post #57
usui wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Quit being dishonest. You're not trying to understand because it's really fucking easy to understand. Again, being very disingenuous. I'm sorry that it's so offensive to you that I was reading the article in Japanese and found it very strange that imperial units were leaking across not only domain topics (semiconductors), but language itself. If you ask me, it's more obtrusive this way than the other way around. I…

> I'm sorry that it's so offensive to you Let's clarify. You're sorry that I find your insults offensive? > Lol every time I see the word "feet" I'm reminded that this article isn't targeted to anyone but Americans > I absolutely have never had to use those units in a serious professional context. > Any time I see a technically-sounding article use units like "feet" and "football fields" I subconsciously find it very…

I don't understand why you're being so antagonistic. Cut it out.

Re: A big hurdle to fixing the chip shortage: substrates

#62

Post by burnte »

runawaybottle wrote: post #43
burnte wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's poorly implemented JIT. People simplified Just In Time to mena "no inventory" and then when a disruption hit, it echoed up and down supply chains. JIT doesn't mean no inventory, it means managing inventory and your supply chain to ensure adequate iventory based on needs both current and forseen. One car example, you should ensure you have 4 times as many tires available as you do cars, because an imbalance there…

Your description doesn’t sound too different (if at all) from the face mask/ventilator shortage at the start of the pandemic. We didn’t stock up, and everyone tried to JIT purchase the necessary equipment. Maybe we all have something to learn from Doomsday preppers.

> Maybe we all have something to learn from Doomsday preppers.

A little, but really just implementing the Toyota Production System properly. You'll never be perfectly prepared for everything, but a lot of the mess over the past 18 months of supply chain problems could have been avoided. In my personal life, I am NOT a prepper, but the way I stock my house, I had no issues with toilet paper, meat, or other weird shortages. I look at what I have no, what I'll need adn when, and how things are going. I didn't look for TP when I was out, I looked for it a week or two ahead of time.

Re: A big hurdle to fixing the chip shortage: substrates

#63

Post by hfktktnfkgk »

lovich wrote: post #34

>Now major chip companies are resorting to unusual tactics. They are placing orders far in advance and prepaying so that substrate companies have ample cash to build more factories. Some are committing to buying the entire supply of new production lines to give their suppliers confidence to invest. If the chip makers are investing this much money into the substrate businesses, why aren't they just purchasing some of…

The chip companies also know that they will definitely buy electricity in the future, yet they are not buying power plants.

In a sense, buying the future substrate production is just a future substrate contract.

Do you know how building a power plant is financed today? Basically someone buys 10 years of gas futures, sells 10 years of equivalent electricity futures, and uses the profit (since electricity is more expensive than gas) to build the power plant that will turn the bought gas into the sold electricity.

Re: A big hurdle to fixing the chip shortage: substrates

#64

Post by brendoelfrendo »

throwaway894345 wrote: post #26
cronix wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's say that all Banana growers were shut down for 8 months and during that time all existing supply was bought up that were sitting on store shelves. After they were allowed to start growing again, how long until you see a Banana in your local store? You better be there when they arrive, because everyone else who has been wanting Bananas is waiting too. On top of that, can the Banana grower even get all of the ite…

I don't think it's that the fabs were shut down because of covid, but rather because automotive manufacturers (and presumably others) forecasted record low sales for 2020 and canceled all of their chip orders such that chip suppliers and upstream fabs had to lay off staff and so on. As I understand it, this was what reduced fab capacity, not "fabs were closing to avoid the risk of covid". On the flip side, rather tha…

Auto makers and others are part of the problems with forecasted demand, but there are also larger supply chain issues. Basically every part of the industry, going back to raw materials, is having similar shortages; either because people shut down for COVID or because they, too, underestimated demand during the pandemic.

Re: A big hurdle to fixing the chip shortage: substrates

#65

Post by throwaway894345 »

brendoelfrendo wrote: post #64
throwaway894345 wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think it's that the fabs were shut down because of covid, but rather because automotive manufacturers (and presumably others) forecasted record low sales for 2020 and canceled all of their chip orders such that chip suppliers and upstream fabs had to lay off staff and so on. As I understand it, this was what reduced fab capacity, not "fabs were closing to avoid the risk of covid". On the flip side, rather tha…

Auto makers and others are part of the problems with forecasted demand, but there are also larger supply chain issues. Basically every part of the industry, going back to raw materials, is having similar shortages; either because people shut down for COVID or because they, too, underestimated demand during the pandemic.

I suspect it has a lot more to do with failing to properly forecast in general, whether overestimation or underestimation. Supply chains are finely tuned for life as usual and they take a long time to recalibrate.

Re: A big hurdle to fixing the chip shortage: substrates

#66

Post by heisenzombie »

cure wrote: post #8

From TFA: > By 2025, she foresees demand for around 185 million square feet of advanced substrate manufacturing space against about 145 million square feet built. It's curious that the production capacity for substrate is expressed in terms of manufacturing space. Is that an industry-specific quirk?

I work in a somewhat related industry and have definitely heard people talk in these terms. I think it's partly because a large percentage of the cost of this sort of manufacturing is embodied in facilities costs, which scale roughly-linearly with area. Because the facilities costs are high, manufacturing is therefore packed in at the maximum possible density, which means that the production capacity ALSO scales roughly-linearly with area.

Bear in mind that actual productive output, or how much a factory cost is quite possibly not public knowledge. But area is (just look at google maps). If you're an insider with some of these ballpark area ratios in your head, you can easily come to some conclusions.

I've likewise heard people talk about building particle accelerators in terms of cost-per-meter. In particular: ballparking the cost of a synchrotron light source as a million USD per meter.

Re: A big hurdle to fixing the chip shortage: substrates

#67

Post by OJFord »

cptskippy wrote: post #35
usui wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you might have missed that I already stated that it's an irrational thing to complain about because units in nature are arbitrary, but given that no one uses these units for the topic at hand, why use them at all? Just for relatability? > It may as well be in hectares or "multiples of some lake somewhere", it's a massive number. We're saying the same thing but arguing for the opposite. Like I said, no one in…

> why use them at all? Just for relatability? Yes. Was that hard? The WSJ didn't write this article for you, it isn't an industry rag. This is like complaining that their scientific articles try to dumb it down for a layman's depth. A football field or soccer field is a perfectly reasonable unit of measure when you're simply trying to convey "a lot" to someone.

> A football field or soccer field is a perfectly reasonable unit of measure when you're simply trying to convey "a lot" to someone.

At least in the UK it's somewhat of a 'meme', a byword for a tabloid, in the same league as irrelevant mentions of age and house price, etc.

Re: A big hurdle to fixing the chip shortage: substrates

#70

Post by lovich »

andrewxdiamond wrote: post #54
lovich wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the article it says they are committing to buying the entire production lines output. Isn't that just committing to spending as much money as building the factories + the profit of the vendor, but with no control over the actual production ?

It’s very unlikely that the deal says “we will buy everything you sell us no matter what.” It’s probably a typical purchasing agreement with tolerances and QA, just paid in advance. Thus there is still a lot of risk being taken on by the fabs. The production could go sour, geopolitics could change, resources might be unavailable, etc. The purchasing companies are externalizing all of this risk by purchasing the produ…

ah, that was the part I did not understand
Post reply on HN