Chip shortage won't end in 2022, says AMD CEO Lisa Su

[mahatmakanejeeves]

Source: Yahoo! Finance

Yahoo Finance

Chip shortage won't end in 2022, says AMD CEO Lisa Su

Brian Sozzi · Anchor, Editor-at-Large
Tue, February 15, 2022, 9:49 AM

The semiconductor shortage roiling industries from automakers Ford and General Motors to industrial products maker 3M is unlikely to end in 2022, hints one of the foremost minds in the space.

"There's tremendous investment that's happening across the semiconductor industry, whether you're talking about on the wafer side or on some of the substrates or the back-end assets. So we are making progress. I do believe that the first half of this year will continue to be quite tight. But the second half of this year, I think things will get a little bit better," AMD CEO Dr. Lisa Su said on Yahoo Finance Live. (1)

Low levels of inventory reflect the rapid buying of semiconductors throughout the pandemic to power demand for work-from-home technologies such as PCs. Demand for chips surged 17% in 2021 from 2019, a new report from the Commerce Department finds. (2)

The median inventory of semiconductor products highlighted by buyers has fallen from 40 days in 2019 to less than five days in 2021, the report says. Inventories in key industries are even smaller, the report contends.

{snip}

Read more: https://finance.yahoo.com/news/chip-shortage-wont-end-in-2022-says-amd-ceo-lisa-su-144915650.html

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(1) https://news.yahoo.com/amd-ceo-lisa-su-says-chip-giants-35-billion-acquisition-of-xilinx-is-a-good-deal-165714616.html

(2) This one? https://www.commerce.gov/news/blog/2022/01/results-semiconductor-supply-chain-request-information

[TheRealNorth]

1. They forgot to mention the cryptocurrency miners...

There was a shortage of graphics cards d/t crypto even before Covid began.

[Tommymac]

3. Large HDD's too.

Some of the new crypto's are based on algorithm's designed to exploit HDD's of 10T or more capacity.

Those prices have been through the roof since 2020, if one can even find any for sale.

[Initech]

5. Yeah those people can go to hell.

Most of us PC / tech enthusiasts hate them because they made it so we can't buy graphics cards.

[IronLionZion]

7. Those mining operations jack up power prices and are bad for climate change too

without adding any value to society

[andym]

11. Ethereum mining will end in June according to reports

That will help with the GPUs, as ethereum is the major culprit there.

[Tommymac]

2. Prices will eventually fall again. Most don't need new laptops or consoles...

the older ones are stlll fine. I'm an IT pro and my pc, laptops etc. are all at least 4 years old and still stand up fine.

The Gaming industry will just need to slow down it's constant push to use more and more processing power needlessly and work within the current chip constraints.

Silicon chips will be at their absolute fastest with no room for any meaningful improvement around 2027 anyway. Too much heat for any current physical substance to deal with.

Quantum computing will change the game anyway in the next decade. Whole new commercially viable physical architecture for that will need to be developed and sold. This is where the new fortunes in IT will start.

[Initech]

6. I spent all my upgrading money when we were in lockdown.

I usually buy a new laptop every 4 years and I'll buy one when my current laptop dies so I'm in no hurry to do so. But I did upgrade my desktop and it should be viable for the next 5+ years with only a CPU upgrade and that's about it. That is one of the nice things about going with AMD over Intel is that my motherboard will still be good for the next several CPU cycles.

[NullTuples]

9. "640K ought to be enough for anybody." - Bill Gates, 1981

[TheRealNorth]

12. I remember my first computer...

It was a Packard Bell with a 386 processor and Windows 3.11 with a 200 MB hard drive. Forget how much RAM it had, although I remember having to fiddle with Config.sys and autoexec.bat to create more conventional memory for some programs to run.

[NullTuples]

13. I would spend *hours* optimizing upper memory. Then QEMM came along & automated the entire process.

And then MS added much of that functionality to DOS itself in version 6.xx. And then non-DOS windows came along and it was all sorta moot. All that knowledge, useless! But, that's computing...

Packard Bell computers btw were physically *solid*!

[Gore1FL]

4. Intel has their own foundries,

They may not be able to use them for the ARC discreet graphics cards, presently, but they should have too many issues with their CPUs.

[NullTuples]

14. True; AMD is fabless

I'm amazed Intel didn't take better advantage of that over the last two years. But as you referenced, they've been busy reworking some of their lowest CPU structures since Spectre / Meltdown. Then there was the 7nm delay announcement in 2020 (after years of 10nm delays). New CEO, new initiatives, all directions changed...this may take a while.

[Unwind Your Mind]

8. What needs to be done to make the things we need here?

My own small story is that I ordered a computer for the business back in November. Dell fooled around pushed back the ship date several times, finally canceling in January with no explanation.

We run six in normal operations and I like to have a backup on hand. It’s not a big problem now but it will be if one of them goes down. I’m sure this is an issue for millions of small to large businesses.

eta, I know I should study up more on this myself but I have to get back to work. I’d be grateful if anyone who knows more about these markets would share their thoughts. Thanks!

[Tommymac]

10. Samsung and Intel plan to open up new chip plants in Texas, probably the Austin area.

All the more reason to turn Texas Blue.

#GOTV2022

[NullTuples]

15. So many US corps put investor returns ahead of solid business practices.

They switched to "just in time" supply chains. The bulk of that chain is overseas, comprised of companies that have customer orders lined up for years.

Few if any contracts have clauses that said, "if the parts are not available and so, I lose my place in line, as soon as the parts are available I get the next spot in line".

And then even if their product does eventually get manufactured it may well end up sitting for months outside a major harbor waiting to be unloaded. At the margins most computer companies operate at, they aren't likely to rent a cargo 747. Especially if all their competitors are quite literally in the same boat.