Shulou(Shulou.com)11/24 Report--

In 2021, with the overall prosperity of the global semiconductor industry, the surge of market demand and the upsurge of capital, "lack of core" and "price rise" have become the key words. In 2022, the market situation has taken a sharp turn for the worse, consumer demand has been declining, corporate inventory has increased significantly, and there has been a trend of price reduction in middle and low-end chips.

From supply falling short of demand to oversupply, the changes in the semiconductor market have caught people off guard. So, how to correctly treat the changes in supply and demand of the semiconductor market, and how to make the semiconductor industry bigger and stronger? At the recent 2022 annual meeting of China's semiconductor market, many experts made suggestions on the development of the semiconductor industry.

Due to the uneven heat and cold of the giants, the structural shortage of the integrated circuit industry is an important pillar of economic development, a key force leading a new round of scientific and technological revolution and industrial change, and a strategic choice to cultivate new momentum for development. it is also an important measure to deepen supply-side structural reform and promote high-quality economic development.

Liu Yuanchao, deputy secretary general of the China Semiconductor Industry Association, said that in recent years, China's integrated circuit industry has achieved high-quality development. In 2021, the industrial scale exceeded trillion yuan for the first time, reaching 1.04583 trillion yuan, an increase of 18.2% over the same period last year, accounting for 29.3% of the global semiconductor industry income. IC design, IC wafer industry, and IC closed test sales revenue reached 451.9 billion yuan, 317.63 billion yuan and 276.3 billion yuan, respectively. Generally speaking, China has become the region with the fastest growth rate of integrated circuit industry, the largest market demand and the most active international trade in the world. Throughout the world, the semiconductor market has also ushered in rapid growth in 2021.

Looking back at the high growth in 2021, the main reason is that after the outbreak of COVID-19, the normalization of home work led to a substantial increase in demand for computers, IoT and other products, while the rapid development of the new energy vehicle market led to a surge in market demand. The epidemic affected the normal operation of the global supply chain, and there was a mismatch between supply and demand, which further increased the market tension. For a time, customers followed the trend of hoarding goods, leading to the "false prosperity" of the market and the global "chip shortage".

When the "lack of core" signal is transmitted to the upstream, the global semiconductor industry has increased its capacity investment, making inventory growth rapidly. Wang Fang, deputy director of Zhongtai Securities Research Institute and chief analyst of the electronics industry, said that with the increase in investment, the global semiconductor inventory turnover has risen for six consecutive quarters, reaching the highest level in nearly 10 years, and many mid-and low-end chips have shown a trend of price reduction. The inventory of semiconductor listed companies has increased by about 60%, resulting in an increase in income without profit. Of course, in the fields of automotive electronics and industrial control applications, it continues to grow rapidly because of the strong market demand.

As we all know, the third quarter of each year is the golden period of the chip industry, but this year, the peak season is not prosperous, corporate revenue and profits decline everywhere. The results released by the industry giants are also uneven: Samsung and Intel suffered a corresponding decline due to falling demand for PC and mobile phones, while Qualcomm and Infineon offset declines and growth in other sectors because of their diversified layout in the automotive and industrial control sectors. On the whole, the semiconductor industry presents a structural shortage with uneven heat and cold.

In addition, due to the shortage of upstream wafer capacity, many enterprises signed long-term agreements with higher foundry prices in 2021 and the first half of 2022, further aggravating the financial pressure.

Entering the 12th cycle, we are still optimistic about how to correctly view the current development situation and future potential of the chip industry through the "roller coaster" change from "lack of core" to "surplus". In this regard, experts at the meeting believe that it is necessary to analyze the problem from a longer perspective.

Wang Fang said that the global semiconductor industry is obviously cyclical. Since 1978, it has experienced 12 cycles, each lasting 3-5 years, and the latest cycle has lasted from 2019 to the present. Precisely because the rise and fall change is the normal state of the market, and the semiconductor industry is a basic, strategic and leading industry, demand for 5G, intelligent networking cars, next-generation artificial intelligence, and ultra-high-definition video will continue to break out in the future. therefore, experts attending the meeting are unanimously optimistic about the future prospects of the semiconductor industry, believing that the market demand for the semiconductor industry will continue to grow in the future.

Li Ke, vice president of Sadie Consulting Co., Ltd., cited a set of data, saying that the 12th round was not the worst in history: according to authorities, the global semiconductor market grew by 7.6% as of November. The global semiconductor market, which grew by 31% in 2010, fell sharply to 0.7% in 2011.

Know what it is, but also need to know why, Liu Dan, managing partner of the Guangdong-Australia Semiconductor Industry Fund, analyzed the nature of cyclical changes in semiconductors. She said that the semiconductor industry cycle consists of two cycles: one is the silicon cycle, which requires a natural cycle for the formation and release of its capacity; the other is the macroeconomic cycle. According to IC Insighrs-related research, the correlation coefficient between global GDP growth and IC market growth in the past 10 years is 0.85. if memory is excluded, the correlation is 0.96. Therefore, to judge whether the semiconductor industry can get out of the downward cycle, we need to pay close attention to three aspects of progress: first, when the terminal demand and economic situation will pick up; second, when the inventory will be digested; and third, whether the production capacity will be superimposed and there will be oversupply. Although the International Monetary Fund and the World Enterprise Federation have predicted that the global economic growth rate in 2023 will be slower than that in 2022, economic growth is the general trend in the long run, and the fundamentals supporting the development of semiconductors have not changed.

Looking to the future, Liu Dan believes that it is very important to continue to increase R & D investment. In the past, semiconductor industry enterprises continued to increase R & D investment, especially listed companies maintained high R & D investment, which injected power into the development of the industry. In the technology-intensive industry of semiconductors, R & D investment is the only magic weapon to determine competitiveness. For example, the US accounted for about half of the world's R & D spending on semiconductors over the past decade, ensuring its leading position in the global semiconductor market.

Li Ke believes that with the arrival of the post-Moore era, industrial cooperation is essential, and it is an inevitable trend for enterprises to shift from "lone ranger" to "brother company". " Moore's Law not only promotes the development of the information industry, but also creates a winner-takes-all situation. In the fields of CPU, GPU, memory, wafer foundry, and so on, only a few companies in the world are particularly ahead. This is because "walking alone is fast". Now entering the post-Moore era, what the industry pursues is not fast but far away, which requires' everyone to go far'. " Li Ke said.

Welcome to subscribe "Shulou Technology Information " to get latest news, interesting things and hot topics in the IT industry, and controls the hottest and latest Internet news, technology news and IT industry trends.