As the prosperity of the semiconductor market continues to decline, the semiconductor “cold wind” blows to the upstream material field, and the silicon wafers and monocrystalline silicon wafers that originally performed relatively well have also begun to loosen.
01 The silicon wafer factory agreed with the customer to delay the shipment
According to the Economic Daily, affected by the destocking of logic ICs and the large production reduction of memory chip manufacturers, the demand for silicon wafers has also continued to decline. Silicon fabs began to agree to customers to delay pulling goods, and the attitude of sticking to the price has also changed, and more manufacturers are willing to cooperate with customers to negotiate prices, and some manufacturers directly said that “the first half of next year may be a little harder.”
It is understood that some silicon fabs in Taiwan have agreed to delay shipments to a small number of customers, delaying them for about one or two months. Other silicon fabs are negotiating with customers to slightly delay pulling goods from the first quarter of next year.
Since this round of market decline, wafer foundries have suffered orders, capacity utilization has declined, memory chip manufacturers have successively reduced capital expenditure and production for the winter, IC design factories have reduced the amount of chips, actively destocked, and even paid liquidated damages to cancel long-term wafer foundry contracts. Now that the cold wind is blowing through silicon wafers, the market is under enormous pressure.
Silicon wafer practitioners frankly, the current long-term customer inventory level has been increasing, probably has reached the limit, some customers have indeed come to discuss the delay of shipment. Overall, the impact of the downturn on silicon fabs may not really emerge until the first quarter of next year, and it is estimated that 8-inch silicon wafers may adjust more than 12-inch silicon wafers.
There is also a loosening in terms of prices, and Taiwan factory Hejing said that it will negotiate with customers in the first half of next year, and will adjust according to market conditions. The outside world believes that the market demand for 6-inch silicon wafers is weak, and the price is more likely to loosen, and the price of silicon wafers above 8 inches has a better chance of maintaining stability.
Although the “cold wind” blows to the silicon fab, the silicon fab expansion plan will not be stopped. It is reported that for the medium and long-term development, the expansion plan of silicon wafer fabs such as Global Crystal, Tai Sembco and Hejing has not stopped.
As for Tai Sembco, the new plant is expected to start mass production in 2024, and the company said that the new plant is progressing as expected. Hejing’s Longtan plant in Taiwan and Zhengzhou plant in mainland China are both expanding their 12-inch silicon wafer production capacity.
Xu Xiulan, chairman of Global Crystal, said that in the short term, including computers, mobile phones and storage devices, it may continue to be weak in the second half of the year, but data centers and automobiles have performed strongly, and the overall market performance is expected to be flat in 2023. In the long run, due to the improvement of the overall economic environment and the gradual balance of chip inventories, growth will resume in 2024.
02 TCL Zhonghuan monocrystalline silicon wafer offer “two consecutive reductions”
According to media reports, TCL Central cut the price of monocrystalline silicon wafers again on November 27, after cutting the price on October 31.
Among them, the quotations of 150μm thickness P-type 210 and 182 silicon wafers were 9.30 yuan/piece and 7.05 yuan/piece, respectively, which were 0.43 yuan/piece and 0.33 yuan/piece lower than the quotations on October 31; The latest quotations of 150μm thickness N-type 210 and 182 silicon wafers were 9.86 yuan / piece and 7.54 yuan / piece, respectively, which were 0.46 yuan / piece and 0.36 yuan / piece lower than the previous round of quotations.
TCL Central said that the price will be implemented from November 28. As inventory pressure in the wafer market continues to increase, wafers are clearly the first upstream price inflection point. From the quotation of TCL Central, the decline rate of all products reached 4.5%.
Under the current market, with the upward transmission of the industrial chain, it is reasonable for the semiconductor “cold wind” to blow into the upstream material field.
Post time: Dec-03-2022