Electronics Audiophile Network Report (Text/Li Wanwan) Recently, market research agency IC Insights counted the revenue of the top ten semiconductor manufacturers in Taiwan in May and June. Data showed that the revenue of many manufacturers declined month-on-month, among which the revenue of driver IC leader Lianyong fell by 26% month-on-month, and the revenue of memory chip manufacturer Nanyake fell by 16%.
In the past six months, the demand for consumer electronics markets such as smartphones and PCs has been sluggish, so that upstream chip products are facing inventory pressure, and prices are reduced to clear inventory, and corporate revenue has also begun to decline. So, in the sluggish demand in the consumer market and severe inventory backlog in the early stage, where are the next market opportunities?
consumer market demand is sluggish, affecting upstream chip sales
In the past six months, due to the epidemic, international conflicts and other reasons, the global economy has been affected, consumers are not willing to consume, and the shipment of consumer electronic products such as smartphones and PCs is sluggish.
According to the latest IDC report, global smartphone shipments fell by 8.9% year-on-year to 314.1 million units in Q1 2022, which is the third consecutive quarter that has declined. In addition to the top five mobile phone manufacturers in the market share, except for the second-ranked Apple , which grew by 2.2%, the shipments of Samsung , Xiaomi , OPPO, and vivo are all falling, with the declines being 1.2%, 17.8%, 26.8%, and 27.7% in turn.
After the growth of the past two years, PC shipments have also begun to decline this year. According to the IDC report, global PC shipments in the second quarter of 2022 were 71.3 million units, a year-on-year decrease of 15.3%, and have declined for two consecutive quarters. The shipments of several major manufacturers, Lenovo , HP , Dell , Acer , Apple, Asus , all fell, among which HP fell by 27.6%.
market demand declined, terminal shipments decreased, upstream driver ICs, MCU, analog chips, memory chips, memory chips, , etc. are facing inventory pressure, and corporate revenue has also declined. In recent times, we can see that various chips have seen price cuts of different amplitudes.
According to the above statistics, the revenue of driver IC leader Lianyong in June fell sharply compared with May, which also revealed that driver IC current sales are not good. There have been news that driver IC prices have declined. It is expected that the decline in driver IC prices will further expand in the third quarter.
Electronic enthusiasts have previously reported that the price of MCU has fallen by more than half. In the past chip price increase, MCU has risen the most fiercely. Many popular general-purpose MCU series in ST have raised prices to varying amplitudes in the past. MCU products of domestic manufacturers such as Gigabit Innovation , Zhongying Electronic , and Shanghai Beiling have also shown price increases to varying amplitudes.
After 2018, ST's MCU products have seen steady price cuts, including 32-bit MCU103, 105 series, 407 series, 8-bit STM8S003 and other products. It is reported that ST's STM32F103C8T66 has now lowered its price from 70 yuan in March to 32 yuan, and STM32F103RCT6 fell back to the 2-digit price from a high of 100 yuan in the first quarter.
analog chips are also facing the same situation. According to previous reports, analog chip giant TI said that with the release of production capacity in the third quarter, the imbalance of supply and demand in the downstream will be alleviated. It is also revealed that most of TI's product prices have dropped by 30% to 40% compared with the high level, and some models of products have been reduced by more than half. The price of
memory chips is also falling, mainly DRAM and NAND Flash. Sales are also declining. Data shows that global DRAM sales in the first quarter fell by 4% month-on-month, and NAND fell by 2%. Samsung and SK Hynix sales in the first quarter both declined to varying degrees. Judging from the above statistics, Nanyake's revenue has also shown a significant decline. Nanyake ranks fourth in the DRAM field. It can be seen that this wave of sluggish consumption in the mobile phone, PC and other markets has a significant impact on DRAM and NAND. The poor sales of
chips have also affected the revenue of wafer foundry factories. Judging from the above statistics, the revenue of TSMC and LIQI have both declined. Although UMC and and the world's advanced have increased, the overall growth is not obvious.
price reduction will continue, where are the next growth opportunities
From the current situation, the chip price reduction will continue in the future, including driver ICs, memory chips, etc. Not long ago, it was reported that Samsung is considering reducing the price of memory chips in the second half of 2022 to gain more market share.
It can be imagined that when market demand weakens and production capacity is gradually released, major manufacturers such as Samsung and TI have begun to reduce prices significantly, and more chip manufacturers will join the ranks of price cuts in the future.
In addition, it is also expected that fabs may slow down in capacity expansion in the future. In the past few years, due to chip shortages, many chip manufacturers have expanded their capacity construction in many places around the world. According to statistics, from 2020 to 2024, a total of 25 8-inch and 60 12-inch fabs will be built, and the wafer production capacity will be greatly improved by that time. In order to meet the capacity gap, manufacturers were actively accelerating capacity construction. Now that the demand in the consumer electronics market has weakened, it is estimated that some planned expansion investment will be postponed.
consumer market demand is weak, so where are the future opportunities for chips and wafer factories? In fact, judging from the current market situation, the demand for consumer electronics markets such as mobile phones and PCs has declined, but the automotive, industry and other fields are still in a growth trend.
, especially in the automotive field, in recent years, the development of electrification and intelligence of automobiles has accelerated, and the number of new energy vehicles has continued to increase in recent years. According to data released by , the number of motor vehicles in the national area reached 406 million, of which the number of new energy vehicles has exceeded 10 million.
In terms of overall sales, statistics from the China Passenger Car Association show that from January to May 2022, the sales of new energy vehicles in general (including ordinary hybrids) reached 4.61 million units, of which hybrid models accounted for 30%, and sales were 1.39 million units. It is estimated that the national sales of new energy passenger cars in June are expected to be 546,000 units, a year-on-year increase of 130% and a month-on-month increase of 30%.
Now, both at the national level and local governments are introducing relevant policies to promote the development of new energy vehicles. It is not difficult to imagine that the sales of new energy vehicles will increase faster in the future. In addition, autonomous driving is also accelerating its development. Not long ago, Shenzhen also issued the first intelligent connected vehicle management regulations in China.
Compared with traditional cars, smart cars need more chips. Data shows that the number of chips in traditional cars is about 500 to 600. With the increase of functions such as autonomous driving and new energy, the number of chips is now about 1,000 to 1,200. Some models that focus on intelligence need more chips.
can also be seen that many chip companies have now turned their targets to the automotive market, but automotive-grade chips are more stringent than consumer-grade chips, with higher entry thresholds, automotive chips have stricter verification standards, higher requirements in terms of operating temperature range, service life, etc., and it takes longer to go from design to mass production. Therefore, it is also difficult for chip companies.
summary
overall, the entire market is no longer in the original state of extremely shortage of chips. The demand in the consumer electronics market is sluggish, causing various chip inventory to rise, prices to drop sharply, and corporate sales to decline. However, there is still a certain chip shortage in the automotive field, and with the rapid development of electrification and intelligence of automobiles, the automotive market is expected to bring new growth to chips.
