Electric vehicles have strong potential in the Indian market. But not everyone in the South Asian country is convinced that a market where about 22 out of 1,000 people own a vehicle is ready for the EV revolution yet, according to DIGITIMES' correspondent in India. In India's mobile telecom market, intense price competition has drastically changed its landscape, with the top-3 carriers dominating over 90% of the market. In the semiconductor sector, AMD is expected to be the first adopt TSMC's SoIC technology fot its HPC chips.
International IDMs are set to raise quotes for automotive MCUs in 2022, and their backend partners in Taiwan are all expected to sustain robust backend momentum through 2022-2023 due to long-term capacity consumption commitments by the IDMs, according to industry sources.
The supply of specialty DRAM and NOR flash memory chips will still fall short of demand in 2022, due to supply-side constraints, according to industry sources.
Malaysia's chip shortages are expected to persist longer even after lockdown were lifted, while Indonesia is looking to start producing electric vehicle (EV) in 2023-24.
High-tech supply chains are encountering the availabilities of different chips that are in varying degrees. Chips such as display driver ICs (DDI) are no longer in tight supply, prompting suppliers of such chips to cut back wafer starts at foundries, according to industry sources.
TSMC's newly-developed system-on-integrated-chips (SoIC) technology will be first adopted for AMD's multiple high-performance computing (HPC) chip series, according to industry sources.
Micron is stepping up expansions of its production capacity, with plans to install EUV tools at its Taiwan fabs in 2024. In China, smartphone shipments to the domestic market slipped 5.4% in September, with local brands accounting for over 90% of the shipments. And supply side issues, such as component shortages, may hinder 5G smartphone shipment growth globally in 2022.
China's Geely Automobile Holdings is reportedly mulling in-house development and production of chipsets for its own vehicles as it has newly expanded its registered businesses to include IC chips manufacturing as well EV battery and electrical motor production, according to industry sources.
September billings among North American manufacturers of semiconductor production equipment increased by a slight 1.7% sequentially to US$3.72 billion, according to SEMI.
The supply of handset-use power management ICs remains severely tight, prompting the chip suppliers to transition to 12-inch wafer manufacturing, according to industry sources.
Supply-side factors, including particulary shortages of power management IC (PMIC) and other components as well as power cuts in China, are very likely to constrain the overall 5G smartphone shipment growth in 2022 after affecting global smartphone sales in the third quarter of 2021, according to industry observers.
Automotive IDMs have already told their clients that their chip prices will go up by 10-20% starting 2022 amid rising compoents and materaisls costs. Foundry quotes have been rising, but they are expected to increase less sharply next year with near-term demand for IC components to remain robust. Foundry houses' race to advance process technologies is promising strong growth for EUV tool vendor ASML.
MediaTek will enter volume shipments of its new-generation 5G modem based on the latest 3GPP 5G R16 standard in 2022, gearing up for a boom in demand for flagship 5G smartphones, according to the mobile SoC company.
Taiwan-based IC design houses, particularly those engaged in consumer ICs, have come under increasing pressure to maintain their quotes for 2022 as customers are more reluctant to accept further price hikes, according to industry sources.
Automotive IDMs have notified their clients about 10-20% price hikes for their chips starting 2022 as they continue to face mounting costs for raw materials, according to industry sources.
Samsung's new NAND flash production capacity is coming, which is likely to create oversupply and exacerbate price falls for the memory. Apple has been relyng on Taiwan-based ODMs for producing its Mac devices, but it reportedly is looking to outsource portions of the Mac production to Chinese makers. But Taiwan's IC substrate suppliers have reportedly entered Apple's supply chain for new Mac chips.
Samsung Electronics and Intel are both striving to win orders for Apple's in-house developed Mac processors, but industry sources believe TSMC will remain the sole supplier for the next-generation Mac series.
Taiwan-based IC substrate suppliers, such as Unimicron Technology, have reportedly cut into the supply chain for Apple's custom-built silicon powering the next generation Macs, and will have a chance to benefit the most from the new offerings among its component suppliers.
MediaTek will soon launch its Dimensity 2000 series application processors designed for flagship smartphones, with the new chipset to be featured in a number of new models slated for launch in the first quarter of 2022, according to industry sources.
Global silicon wafer area shipments will register robust growth through 2024, when about 16 billion square inches are forecast to be shipped, according to SEMI.
Whether its high-end speakers for audiophiles or true wireless headphones that have become popular in recent years, speakers of today are still built based on traditional structures. Although the audio quality is excellent, the size and costs of traditional structures are not decreasing, even with the popularization of various wearable devices. The CEO of Sounds Great, Ted Zhou, stated that semiconductors have transformed microphones in the past and have become the current mainstream technology. "This wave of transformation will also happen to speakers. Semiconductor speaker modules will become the future trend in audio technology."
