It will be better for the world to have a more balanced supply chain, to mitigate some of the disruptive challenges witnessed in the semiconductor ecosystem.
So said Maurits Tichelman, Intel VP of sales and marketing and GM for EMEA territories, speaking at an Intel-hosted media roundtable about the challenges facing the global supply chain and semiconductor ecosystem.
The global computing industry has been rocked by massive supply constraints over the past two years, leading to shortages in electronic components.
While the constraints in the ecosystem were expected to last until mid-2022, targets have shifted as constraints are anticipated to persist through the rest of the year and into 2023.
Tichelman concurred there have been some significant disruptors over the last 24 months, leading to a constrained global supply chain.
He explained that at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, some industries pushed back on their manufacturing capacity due to concern that they would not be able to sell their products.
However, other sectors doubled-down in consumption of semiconductors; for example, the computer industry – notebooks were in significant demand but also other digital devices, he stated.
Other industries also realised they still wanted to have those orders on the books to start planning for the next steps.
“The supply chain became very constrained, with the overall global capacity being highly dependent on Asia,” noted Tichelman. “We all felt that pain.
“It’s a challenge if all of us are dependent on 70% of the manufacturing of chips coming out of Asia, especially when we saw the disruption due to COVID-19.
“There are a lot of activities within Europe, in the European Union (EU), which hopefully at the global level we’ll start seeing a more balanced supply chain.”
Europe used to be above 20% in terms of semiconductor manufacturing, but that’s now changed to between 8% and 9%, according to Tichelman.
The EU, he added, has come out come to state it wants the manufacturing of chipsets to get back to 20% by 2030, which he believes is a “very ambitious” goal.
The Intel VP indicated the computer industry is seeing more balancing out at the moment, compared to six months ago.
“It’s significantly improved. Our output for our traditional computer chips has significantly increased. We’ve been able to manage that to a much larger extent.
“The overall demand for chips continues to be strong, double-digit growth going into 2030 and beyond, and that’s also why we are investing in manufacturing capacity.”
Share