THE SUPPLY CHAIN
Semiconductors:
highlights the multiple rifts going through the entire industry. Technically and commercially the semiconductor market is split between leading-edge devices and applications and the rest of the world and between a few big, multi-million-device platform customers and the rest of the world struggling to get their supplies. No doubt, 2021 was a strong year, despite
the COVID-19 backlash. European Components distribution on average grew by about 20%, with slight variations by country, to a total of over 16 Billion Euro. The market itself (including direct business) grew even stronger. According to recent predictions published by the World Semiconductor Trade Statistics (WSTS), the global semi market ended with a plus of over 25%, so did Europe. A giant backlog, based on massive
bookings, and a continuing strong order stream from all customer segments until the
The New Two-Class-Society T
Georg Steinberger, Chairman of the Board, FBDi association reports on the European semiconductor market
he current supply crisis in semiconductors (and components in general) just
very end of 2021 (and probably beyond) suggest that 2022 should or will also turn out very positive – double-digit - unless we are sitting on a bubble that will just disappear. Clearly, the bookings are going way outside the normal order window and represent a consolidated demand reaching very far into the future. Customers, whose raw goods inventories (yes, components are raw goods) were pretty low in 2020, were triggered by the ongoing shortage to plan far ahead, and that is what we see. Will this future demand still be real in a few
months? Absolutely. It is not very likely that it will just disappear and all the factors that are currently driving behaviour are not changing overnight either. The question that boggles every European distributor and customer is when will we see the turning point? Turning point in this case is to be defined as a decline from current ordering peaks to a more normal situation, a better balance between booking and billings. The severity of the current supply chain
16 DECEMBER/JANUARY 2022 | ELECTRONICS TODAY
Georg Steinberger, Chairman of the board, FBDi association
situation – or components shortage – can be seen in the fact that even TV news are reporting about it. And everyone and his brother has an opinion on how long the shortage and subsequent price increases will last. The span of predictions is from end of
Q1/2022 to mid-2024, all probably as valid as the individual conditions under which they were uttered. A recent informal anonymous survey among distributors revealed a huge level of uncertainty about this turning point on the cycle, but summarising the expectations to a “after summer, towards end of Q3/2022” would probably find significant number of supporters. By then we
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