The semiconductor wafer shortage has not yet eased, and the equipment shortage has begun to become a major problem for semiconductor upstream and downstream supply chain industry players to face together. Recently, various factories have successively expanded capital expenditures. To meet the huge semiconductor business opportunities, the demand for equipment has greatly increased, and the delivery time has become longer and longer. From upstream silicon wafers to its downstream foundry and memory industries, everything is Affected by the lack of equipment, it may drag down the pace of industrial investment, resulting in the failure of new factories or expansion plans to go online as expected.
Since the second half of last year, the market demand has increased significantly, and the semiconductor supply chain has been in short supply. Semiconductor factories have actively expanded their production capacity and stimulated the growth of manufacturing equipment sales. However, affected by the epidemic control of people flow and logistics, factory engineering human resources are also insufficient, and equipment delivery time. Affected by factors such as the shortage of chips, the continuous expansion will affect the production expansion progress of the fab.
The original market expected that as the chip shortage eased, the delivery time of equipment factories in the second half of this year was expected to be shortened. However, the semiconductor lithography equipment leader Esmore (ASML-US) CEO Peter Wennink recently warned that because the supply chain cannot keep up with the pace of production expansion, there will be a shortage of equipment in the next two years. To meet customer demand, production capacity must be greatly increased by more than 50%; Esmore’s remarks also Sound the alarm for the shortage of semiconductor equipment.
In the past one or two years, the demand for semiconductors has greatly increased, and the wafer foundry capacity is extremely short. In response to the huge order demand from customers, wafer foundries and IDM factories have successively invested in expanding production. With large-scale investment in new factories, the industry is worried that it will not be able to keep up with the needs of upstream and downstream customers in a timely manner, and silicon wafer fabs have also started production expansion plans simultaneously.
However, the silicon wafer fab admits that due to factors such as transportation and equipment factory capacity, the equipment delivery schedule is more severe than originally expected, and some equipment that is finally shipped and inspected is the same as the equipment used by the client, except for other peers. Competing for equipment also forms a rare situation of competing with customers for equipment. Industry insiders believe that with the staggering pace of machine expansion in the industry chain, the shortage of foundry capacity will continue.
From the perspective of the expansion plan of semiconductor factories, most of them will be mass-produced from the second half of 2023, and will reach a peak in 2024. Whether the production equipment can be successfully obtained, whether the semiconductor factory can maintain its market position, or even further expand the market. One of the keys to share.
