TSMC R&D SVP Expects Chip Shortage to Persist Until 2024-2025

[TheLostSwede]

In an interview with IEEE Spectrum Dr. Y.J. Mii, Senior Vice President of Research and Development at TSMC, said that he believes that we're not going to see an end to the chip shortage until the next generation of fabs that are currently under construction, or will commence soon, come online in two to three years. Interestingly, Mii is apparently not putting the blame squarely at the pandemic as so many others have for the components shortage, but rather points towards the fact that chips are being used in just about every kind of product these days. This has in turn led to much higher demands for semiconductors, without the infrastructure to manufacture enough of them being in place.

He also believes the industry as a whole missed the fact that the demand for a wide range of semiconductors was growing as quickly as it has been over the past few years. On the upside, it seems like the semiconductor manufacturers have understood what's going on and they're investing heavily in making sure that they can meet demand, both in the near term and longer term. Interestingly, he also mentions how hard it is, even for a company like TSMC, to progress their nodes today. He's quoted saying "Before, we could achieve the next-generation node by fine-tuning the process, but now for every generation we must find new ways in terms of transistor architecture, materials, processes, and tools. In the past, it's pretty much been a major optical shrink, but that's no longer a simple trick." It looks like the semiconductor manufacturers are going to have to come up with some new, innovative ways to be able to keep making better and faster semiconductors in the not too distant future.



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[Sybaris_Caesar]

I'm confused. Haven't Chinese industry been active since last year or so? Since they claim to have "defeated" the pandemic very early. I know everyone and their dogs suddenly bought PCs or upgraded their tech at the start of the pandemic. But are they doing it every year since then? I know some jobs became permanent WFH but many are calling back their employees to work for few months now.

Can industry insider tell me where's the lack of supply and excess of demand?

 

[TheinsanegamerN]

Oh, so you mean all those lofty goals of the shortages being over in q4 2022, I mean q4 2023, I mean bleh bleh bleh, are all BS and this shortage will continue so long as prices stay high?

Color me shocked.

I'm confused. Haven't Chinese industry been active since last year or so? Since they claim to have "defeated" the pandemic very early. I know everyone and their dogs suddenly bought PCs or upgraded their tech at the start of the pandemic. But are they doing it every year since then? I know some jobs became permanent WFH but many are calling back their employees to work for few months now.

Can industry insider tell me where's the lack of supply and excess of demand?

It's shipping, the entire shipping industry is hitting one bottleneck after another.

See also: the ever growing number of ships waiting on california harbor access, the shipping containers sitting on peoples lawns in LA, the overflowing railyards. Getting anything OUT of china is like shoving 10lbs of shat into a 1lb bag.

 

[TheLostSwede]

I'm confused. Haven't Chinese industry been active since last year or so? Since they claim to have "defeated" the pandemic very early. I know everyone and their dogs suddenly bought PCs or upgraded their tech at the start of the pandemic. But are they doing it every year since then? I know some jobs became permanent WFH but many are calling back their employees to work for few months now.

Can industry insider tell me where's the lack of supply and excess of demand?

Semiconductors ≠ PCs.

Read the source article and you'll see that some of the key stuff now is server chips, "AI" stuff and automotive chips.

 

[Sybaris_Caesar]

Semiconductors ≠ PCs.

Read the source article and you'll see that some of the key stuff now is server chips, "AI" stuff and automotive chips.

Aren't those sales inked years in advance? And companies have historical and forecasted sales data, is it not?
I can at least understand automotive chips side of the equation. Fabs are unwilling to produce loss-inducing old chips cars used.

But still those are very expensive chips per unit. You can buy 100 pieces of $500 phones/laptops for the price of $50,000 worth of enterprise tech or a similarly priced vehicle. So excuse me if those "key stuff" fail to convince me.

And I know historical data and forecast got wrenched in the face of lockdowns. But they're not saying shortage will subside after backorders are fulfilled. They're saying it'll subside after newer/more production facilities get online to meet increased demand.

And I still haven't seen news of this record-breaking demand. Nor any news of supply being at a standstill.

 

[mechtech]

Hmmm. I don’t know. Before the pandemic there didn’t seem to be any shortfalls like we have now. Although amd Polaris was done on GF as were the first gens of Ryzen.

maybe it’s just everyone using TSMC that’s exasperated the problem?

 

[TheLostSwede]

Aren't those sales inked years in advance? And companies have historical and forecasted sales data, is it not?
I can at least understand automotive chips side of the equation. Fabs are unwilling to produce loss-inducing old chips cars used.

But still those are very expensive chips per unit. You can buy 100 pieces of $500 phones/laptops for the price of $50,000 worth of enterprise tech or a similarly priced vehicle. So excuse me if those "key stuff" fail to convince me.

And I know historical data and forecast got wrenched in the face of lockdowns. But they're not saying shortage will subside after backorders are fulfilled. They're saying it'll subside after newer/more production facilities get online to meet increased demand.

And I still haven't seen news of this record-breaking demand. Nor any news of supply being at a standstill.

Yes and no. How do you react to increased demand?
What did the EV market look like five years ago compared to today?
How do you predict how many new companies there are going to be per year that wants to buy your chips and in what quantity?

Not all cars use old chips, although a lot of chips are very much commodity items today, used in the billions, but someone has to produce them, or we can't build the things we want to build. The EV industry multiplied the needs of these chips by not an insignificant number, something that wasn't even being considered a requirement just a few years ago.

I was reading the other day that I think it was Hyundai are using consumer chips in some of their cars, as they can't get enough parts otherwise.

Your $500 doesn't have all the same components in it as a $50,000 enterprise server though, does it? In fact, they might share none at all.

The problem is that the orders keep coming in and with the shipping issues mentioned above, companies keep placing orders for more chips, which means the backlogs aren't being cleared, since the parts aren't reaching the customers, so they order extra parts with every new order, just to make sure that they have local stock, just in case.

I guess you need to read som industry publications instead of the regular news media, as they don't seem to be overly interested in what's going on in the chip industry.

Hmmm. I don’t know. Before the pandemic there didn’t seem to be any shortfalls like we have now. Although amd Polaris was done on GF as were the first gens of Ryzen.

maybe it’s just everyone using TSMC that’s exasperated the problem?

It's part of the problem, but one of the largest culprits is the EV makers.
I mean, there isn't a CPU shortage, if you want an x86 chip, but if you want a custom chip for a new EV, well, that's an entirely different kettle of fish.
Also, as we've written about here several times before (as in, not just me), there's a shortage of everything from capacitors to power regulation components and TSMC doesn't make much of that.

 

[ShurikN]

That's just great. Guess I'll be sticking with this RX470 for 3 more years.... Thank God for freesync.

 

[ThrashZone]

Hi,
Yeah I've had a new appreciation for my current gpu's that started long ago

 

[Easo]

I would like to have some good news, for once. I do see that prices have fallen a bit even here in Latvia, but I assume that they are going to rise again due to sanction blowbacks.
Ehh...