01. DRAM price growth stalls as customers resist price hikes
In smartphones, PCs, and data center servers, the price of DRAM, which is used to temporarily store data, has stopped rising, and buyers are not active in purchasing, which has affected the rise in DRAM prices.
It is understood that the contract price of the benchmark product DDR4 8GB in June was about US$2.10, and the contract price of the smaller 4GB was about US$1.62, which was flat, mainly due to the price negotiations between supply and demand, which showed a tug-of-war situation.
02. Supply chain: Passive component prices are expected to rise by 20%
July 16, 2024, According to the supply chain, passive electronic component manufacturers such as Murata and TDK are expected to increase the quotes of products such as multilayer inductors and ferrite beads by 20%.
Industry insiders pointed out that silver accounts for 60% of the raw material cost of multilayer inductors and magnetic beads. As the price of silver has soared by nearly 40% this year, the cost of manufacturers’ multilayer inductors and ferrite beads has been greatly increased.
Industry analysts believe that after more than a year of inventory adjustment, the passive component industry’s inventory has recently returned to a healthy level. Coupled with the arrival of the peak season and rising raw material costs, there is a chance that passive electronic components such as multilayer inductors and ferrite beads will see price increases about 10% to 20%.
03. Infineon ranks first in global automotive semiconductor market
According to a report released by Semiconductor Intelligence, the automotive semiconductor market size in 2023 was $67 billion, an increase of 12% over 2022, and the top twelve suppliers accounted for more than three-quarters of the market share.
According to the ranking released by Semiconductor Intelligence, Infineon is the largest automotive semiconductor supplier with a scale of $9.2 billion and a market share of 13.7%; NXP Semiconductors ranks second with a market share of 11.2%; STMicroelectronics ranks third with a market share of 10.6%. These three companies account for more than one-third of the market share. For most companies, the automotive business is an important part of their total revenue. Among the top six companies, the revenue share of the automotive business ranges from 34% to 56%.
04. Samsung suspends construction of foundry production line at Pyeongtaek P4 plant
July 17, 2024, According to reports, Samsung foundry has difficulty in obtaining large foundry customers and has postponed the construction of foundry production line at Pyeongtaek P4 plant, while the more profitable memory production line has been prioritized.
The report pointed out that the Pyeongtaek P4 plant is a state-of-the-art semiconductor production plant consisting of four phases, including foundry and memory production lines. Samsung originally planned to first build the memory production line PH1, then the wafer foundry production line PH2, followed by the memory production line PH3, and finally the wafer foundry production line PH4 to complete the construction of P4.
05. Inventec and MiTAC AI orders are overflowing
Recently, it was learned that the four domestic giants ByteDance, Alibaba, Baidu, and Tencent have successively expanded their self-developed AI chips and accelerated the introduction of data centers. At the same time, they continue to introduce NVIDIA’s downgraded H20 chips, triggering a huge demand for AI server foundry. Inventec and MiTAC are on the list of preferred foundries, and orders are full.
Among them, Inventec holds AI orders from Baidu, Alibaba, Tencent, and ByteDance, and also assists brand manufacturers Sugon in OEM orders for overseas data centers. MiTAC also won a large order from the leading server brand manufacturer Inspur. With the obvious increase in domestic customer demand from the second quarter, the momentum for H20 server purchases has increased, and related demand is expected to continue into the second half of the year.
