The lack of PS5 and Xbox Series X stock around the world is just the tip of the iceberg of what is to come. This is stated in The Guardian , where they anticipate that the high demand that currently exists in the technology industry cannot be covered by the current volume of factories. There are few chips for so much technology.
Semiconductor drought
At first it was the pandemic. The state of confinement worldwide and the crisis caused by the epidemic slowed markets to disastrous levels, causing a delay in production chains by the time things gradually started again. The clearest example of these delays is seen in the launch of the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X , two consoles that to this day still do not have spare units in stores after five months of launch.
But this has only been the beginning. The shortage of chips is going to continue to worsen, and a kind of perfect storm is currently forming in which the delay in supplies together with the high demand in the market are giving life to a kind of crisis that could end in a period of time. out of stock at a massive level.
For starters, giants like Ford have canceled shifts at two of their auto plants because there are no materials to keep the work going. This will lead to losses of up to 2.5 billion dollars. Nissan is another of the car manufacturers that is also taking action, since today it keeps the plants in Mexico and the United States inactive due to the same problem: the lack of chips.
An impending crisis …
The worst thing is that this cocktail of coincidences is especially affecting vehicle manufacturers. With the virus stopped, brands stopped selling their cars, stopped production and canceled chip orders. This stoppage made them stop being an important customer for chip factories, and now that they are trying to return to normality, other manufacturers with greater demand are ahead of their turn.
And, as Neil Campling, an analyst at Mirabaud points out, if Apple spends 56,000 million dollars a year, who is going to pay attention to a car brand that places orders worth 4,000 million? Now that things are getting more complicated with stock, chipmakers want to keep the fat cows, bypassing “smaller customers,” and that’s just what is happening to carmakers.
In any case, the situation is much more serious, and it will also affect the big technology companies, since Samsung has confirmed that it will have to delay the launch of its next flagship (a decision that is even more shocking if we take into account that Samsung, in addition to sell to others, he makes his own chips for himself).
… Which will result in a rise in prices
And in the end, the one who will pay for the broken dishes will be the consumer. With the levels of demand for products going through the roof and a limited stock of semiconductors, the law of supply and demand will force prices to rise, so that both new vehicles and mobile phones could have higher labels than usual. normal. So watch out for what’s next, it’s not going to be nice.
