Qualcomm
We have already seen the global shortage of chips affect cars, computers and consoles. Next, Qualcomm? A new Reuters report gathers a lot of quotes from the mobile industry that basically say, “Yep, our chips are running out.”
Qualcomm is currently working hard against it. First, like everyone in the electronics industry, the pandemic has increased the demand for all kinds of work-from-home equipment and entertainment products, while the factories that manufacture the items are occasionally forced.
In addition, Qualcomm has to deal with the greater demand thanks to the ongoing sanctions against Huawei. Huawei’s HiSilicon division was one of Qualcomm’s few Android SoC competitors (along with Samsung’s Exynos line), and Huawei worked long and hard to cut all US chips from its supply chain. The US sanctions against Huawei meant that he could not get a steady supply of chips, and his market share fell (even in China). The businesses that are moving into Huawei’s old grassland are mostly Qualcomm homes that do not have a problem shipping US chips, so the demand is greater.
Qualcomm’s third problem is the weather in Texas. Record colds in February dropped the state’s power grid for several days, and one of the many victims was a Samsung Electronics foundry in Austin. The foundry produces $ 3.7 billion worth of chips annually, with Qualcomm and Tesla among its largest customers. However, thanks to the power outage, the plant has been down since February 16, and it is predicted to decline by mid-April. Reuters says it is unclear whether this extra issue still affected smartphone manufacturing.
The report examines Samsung’s phone division, saying: ‘One person at a Samsung supplier said that a shortage of Qualcomm chips was affecting the production of mid- and low-end Samsung models. The second person, at another supplier, said there was a shortage of Qualcomm’s new flagship chip, the Snapdragon 888, but did not say whether it would affect the production of Samsung’s luxury phones. Samsung warned of a shortage of smartphones earlier in January.
Reuters then talks to a senior executive at a top contract maker for several major smartphone brands (I’m going to take a guess and call this company ‘Foxconn’) and writes that this anonymous company has a shortage of a range of Qualcomm components and will cut the shipping of devices this year. ‘
Xiaomi also stepped in, while Vice President Lu Weibing wrote on Sina Weibo last month: “This is not a shortage, this is an extreme shortage.”
Since everyone in the mobile industry knows that there is going to be a shortage, the result is the mobile equivalent of storage toilet paper. Reuter’s report states that “panic buying” has gripped the industry, and that it is increasing the cost of even the cheapest components of almost all microchips. Simon Wan, co-founder of the Roborock robot vacuum company, told Reuters: “Everyone places orders like crazy, when in fact they can’t use up all their chips.”