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component shortage Electronic Components

Automotive electronics market set to grow

Automotive Electronics Market set to grow

With vehicles getting smarter, more connected and more autonomous, the automotive electronics market looks set to soar.

Future growth in numbers

Back in March, Precedence Research predicted the automotive electronics market would hit around US$ 640.56 billion by 2030.

Then, in July, Global Market Insights released research predicting the automotive electronics market would hit around US$ 380 billion by 2027.

Interestingly, measured across the same period, both research reports (which are independent) predict a similar growth pattern. Global Market Insights predicts a 6% CAGR, while Precedence Research predicts a CAGR of 7.64% over a 3-year longer period.

With two separate reports indicating significant annual growth. The automotive electronics market looks set to boom. But wait, there’s more.

A 9.3% CAGR is expected in the automotive electronics market by 2030, according to research by P&S Intelligence. They predict slightly less growth than Precedence Research to 2030, at US$ 615.3 billion (versus $640.56 billion).

Growth factors

There are approximately 1,400 chips in a typical vehicle today. Which each chip housing thousands of components on a semiconductor wafer, creating integrated circuits that power computing, memory, and a host of other tasks.

Those are just the chips.

Cars have thousands of other electronic components, including passive, active and  interconnecting electronic components. From batteries, sensors and motors, to displays and cameras. Oh, and everything is connected.

All told, a typical car today has more than 50,000 electronic components that enable features like in-car Wi-Fi, self-parking technology, adaptive headlights, semi-autonomous driving technology, keyless entry, and powered tailgates.

However, cars are getter smarter and more advanced. Electronic components today make up around a third the cost of a car, which will increase over time as more sophisticated and greater numbers of components are used.

Smarter cars need more components  

The future of cars involves electrification, autonomous and self-driving technologies, hyperconnectivity, Internet of Things, augmented reality, artificial intelligence, biometrics and a whole host of next-generation technologies.

How will these be enabled? With electronic components.

Let’s take electrification as an example. An electric car handbook will tell you an electric car has a motor, a battery, an on-board charger, and an Electronic Control Unit (ECU) that controls one or more of the electrical systems or subsystems in the vehicle. Together, these let you drive around, charge, and pop to the shops.

In-between these systems, are hundreds of thousands of electronic components that make them work. You see, an Electronic Control Unit is a single component, containing thousands of smaller components, each performing a critical role.

The automotive electronics market is set to soar because cars and other vehicles will need more components with electrification and next-gen technologies. Sometimes, things can be simple to explain, and this is one of those times.

Meeting demand

The electronics industry is facing a global chip and electronic component shortage which is expected to last 2-3 years. As demand for automotive electronics soars, shortages look very likely for certain components like CPUs and memory.

The solution for many companies will be to use an electronics component distributor, to fill gaps in the supply chain and keep things moving.

Electronic component distributors like Lantek can source hard-to-procure components because we have relationships with the best suppliers in the industry. Contact us today with your inquiries at sales@lantekcorp.com or call 1-973-579-8100

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Electronic Components passive components

Passive and Interconnecting Electronic Components market to display lucrative growth

Interconnecting components market displays lucrative growth

The passive and interconnecting electronic components market is predicted to display lucrative growth across all regions over 2020-2025, with North America the dominant market due to the prominence of players in the country.

These predictions come from The Passive and Interconnecting Electronic Components market report from Market Study Report, which you can request a sample of. The report delivers a rigorous analysis of the market, examining the main growth drivers and restraints, as well as opportunities for revenue cycles.

The passive and IEC markets are forecasted to experience a CAGR (compound annual growth rate) of 3.1% from 2020-2025, with the US market expected to reach $32.3 billion by 2025, up from $28.6 billion in 2020.

Key players in the industry include:

  • ABB
  • API Technologies
  • AVX Corporation
  • ST Microelectronics
  • 3M Electronics
  • Fujitsu Component
  • American Electronic Components
  • Hamlin
  • Eaton Corp.
  • Datronix Holding Ltd

As the world gets smarter and demand for passive and interconnecting electronic components increases, small players will also take a bigger role. Trade barriers caused by geography will need to be overcome to meet demand, fuelling an explosion in growth across all developed markets, from Europe to Asia Pacific.

What is fuelling growth?

While the report provides in-depth analysis of factors that will fuel growth, we don’t want to tread on its toes, so we’ll provide a simpler analysis.

The reason the passive and interconnecting electronic component markets are going to experience significant growth over the next several years is because of industry tailwinds and technological advancement. Given today’s technological innovation, it’s no wonder that demand for all types of electronic component is soaring.

Disruptive new technologies, rapid advancement in existing technologies and the adoption of smarter, more connected devices, is fuelling unprecedented demand for everything from passive components to chips.

For example, in 2021, manufacturing of passive components could see an 11% increase, but demand is likely to exceed 15%.

Making supply meet demand

There has been a lot of talk about how the next great technological cycle will fuel growth for the semiconductor industry, but it’s important to recognize that chips are nothing but silicon and metal without other components like passives and IECs.

While supply for some components like display drivers is ticking along, there is a global shortage for other components like active, passive and electro-mechanical components, putting manufacturers in a compromised position.

The shortage for some IECs and passive components is expected to last several years, so making supply meet demand will be a challenge in the near future.

To make supply meet demand, suppliers and manufacturers will need to partner with well-connected distributors. Electronic component distributors are the best-connected players in the supply chain, linking sellers with buyers and vice versa.

Sourcing and allocating shortage electronic components is something that we specialize in at Lantek. We help source components that are impossible to find, helping to keep supply chains moving and manufacturing plants going.

With the passive and interconnecting electronic components market set to soar, planning is essential to make supply meet demand and capitalize on growth.

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component shortage Electronic Components Lead Time

Why We’re Facing a Global Semiconductor Shortage

semiconductor

Why We're Facing a Global Semiconductor Shortage

The world is experiencing a semiconductor shortage at a time when demand for semiconductors is at an all-time high. Manufacturers can’t make enough of them and we’re now seeing this affect the availability of products. You probably remember last year Sony released the PlayStation 5 and Microsoft released the Xbox Series X. AMD released the Big Navi GPU (RX 6000) and Apple released the iPhone 12 range. What all these products have in common is they were all directly affected by the semiconductor shortage. Demand well and truly exceeded supply.
What’s causing the shortage?
A perfect storm has hit the semiconductor market. It isn’t one thing but a combination of different things that’s causing the shortage today.
The COVID-19 pandemic
When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, car and commercial vehicle sales took a hit. Estimates suggest that sales fell by 50% or more within a single month. In response, car manufacturers scaled back orders for semiconductors and other parts. At the same time, demand for electronics chips soared as more people spent time working from home and on furlough. Laptops, smartphones, drones, smartwatches, tablets, kitchen appliances – everything has a semiconductor nowadays. Then you have IT, data centres, internet infrastructure and cloud and edge computing. All are powered by semiconductors. And so, the factories that were at capacity making semiconductors for cars switched to making semiconductors for electronics. This was a blessing in disguise for factories because semiconductors for electronics have a higher margin. However, it has caused a problem for car manufacturers who now need to ramp up production. The situation now is this – car sales are picking up and car manufacturers are fighting for orders against electronics manufacturers. Factories are at capacity and can’t make enough to go around. This is feeding through to nearly every sector. Ultimately, this is the result of poor planning from car makers who cut orders too deeply last year at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Manufacturing limitations
Even before the COVID-19 pandemic hit, there weren’t enough factories to meet semiconductor demand. There were long lead times in 2019 because semiconductor demand outpaced the ability of factories to make them. This problem has persisted through to 2021 and has been compounded by the COVID-19 pandemic. With most factories running at 99-100% capacity, there is very little room for boosted output. You would think that the solution is to build more factories, but this would not solve the problem today or even a year from now because semiconductor fabs take at least a year to build with another 6-12 months in setup time. Semiconductor manufacturers are investing in new factories, expansion and more efficient technologies, but short-term solutions these are not. The US is attempting to bring semiconductor manufacturing to US soil to remedy this or at least reduce dependency on foreign suppliers.
US and China trade war
Calls for domestic manufacturing are heating up in the US and China, the result of a trade war brought about mostly by supply chain disruptions related to the COVID-19 pandemic. Reports in May 2020 that the Trump administration was in talks with Intel, TSMC, and Samsung about building US chip factories proved true. In 2021, with a new president and Biden administration, these talks are persisting. The reason a technology trade war broke out between the US and China is because the US imposed a 25 per cent tariff on $34 billion of Chinese imports in 2018. There has been bad blood ever since with threats and action on both sides. This eventually affected the semiconductor supply chain because in 2020 the US turned to export restrictions targeting the semiconductor supply chain to safeguard critical infrastructure in the telecommunications sector. This followed a 2019 ban on the Chinese company Huawei for “national security reasons”. For example, one of the consequences of export restrictions was that American firms were cut off from chips made by China’s Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation – the third largest chip maker in the world with 11% market share.
Local production problems
Factory shutdowns due to natural disasters, bad weather and the COVID-19 pandemic have caused semiconductor supply chain issues. Most of the world’s semiconductors are manufactured in Taiwan. Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co., the world’s largest contract chipmaker, has a 28% market share. The second largest, UMC, also based in Taiwan, has a 13% market share. Taiwan is experiencing serious water droughts in 2021. Millions of tonnes of water are required to manufacture semiconductors every week. Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing is having to bring water in on trucks and UMC are doing the same. This has caused significant drops in manufacturing efficiency. The US is also experiencing shutdowns. NXP Semiconductors had to shut its plant in Austin, Texas, due to winter weather in February 2021. Factory shutdowns cause order backlogs and extended lead times. Orders persist and pile in whether a factory is down or not. This squeezes supply chains, causing a shortage.
How long will the semiconductor shortage persist?
We expect the semiconductor shortage to persist through 2021 but ease towards the end of the year as demand for electronics chips decreases as COVID-19 lockdowns end. This will cause a shift in supply from electronics semiconductors to automotive semiconductors which will provide the industry with a much-needed equilibrium. The world’s largest semiconductor manufacturers – TSMC, UMC, SMIC, Samsung, Intel, SK Hynix – are investing in increased output. Many investments were in the pipeline as early as 2019 and are expected to yield results at the end of 2021. Right now, there is a serious imbalance in the demand for semiconductors, one that our existing infrastructure is not built to cope with. This imbalance will ease over time.
How can supply chains continue to meet demand?
If you have been impacted by the semiconductor shortage you can meet demand by partnering with an electronics components distributor like us. We specialise in the procurement and delivery of semiconductors and parts for a wide variety of industries from the world’s leading manufacturers. You can find out more about what we do here.