At present, wafer foundry, IDM and Tier 1 suppliers have taken a step back, and it is estimated that the full foundry quotation in 2023 will be increased by a single-digit percentage, but it still varies according to customers and order sizes. Some automakers admitted frankly that they are still in the agreement with the foundry, and different wafer foundries have different proportions of automotive production capacity and different levels of price adherence.

For the automotive supply chain, the biggest limitation is still the limited manufacturing process of foundries that meet vehicle regulations, which is also the main reason for the continued shortage of automotive chips. In view of the foundry price of automotive chips in 2023, the mainstream automotive supply chain considers the shortage, and still tends to negotiate from the perspective of long-term planning and cooperation.

The author has learned that the shortage of automotive chips in the past two years is mainly reflected in the following four aspects:

1. Foundry quotations for automotive chips have surged over the past few years as demand sharply exceeds supply. But inflationary pressures and other factors have clouded the demand outlook for next year, prompting automakers to re-examine risks and costs.

2. Most automotive chips are purchased by supply chain system manufacturers (engine control, instrument panel electronics, etc.), not by car manufacturers, resulting in more complex supply chains.

3. Most of the automotive chips use mature manufacturing processes.

4. Automotive chips have a long design cycle and have to meet a variety of strict specifications. Therefore, it is difficult for car manufacturers to change suppliers in a short period of time.

At present, the world's major chip foundries have their own economic considerations when choosing to process other chips or process automotive MCU microcontrollers. Automotive control modules use a large number of MCU microcontrollers. The main suppliers are Renesas, Infineon, NXP, ST, TI, Microchip, six mainstream MCU manufacturers, and occupy more than 90% of the global automotive MCU share.

Based on cost and performance considerations for automotive MCUs, the process nodes are basically concentrated in the traditional range of 40-45nm process nodes. The six major MCU manufacturers will basically outsource most of the IDM chip production to TSMC and other foundries, especially TSMC's market share of 60%-70% of the total global automotive MCU foundry.

Compared with consumer-grade chips, automotive-grade chips have high production requirements and low profits. The output value only accounts for about 10% of the industry's output value. In the case of increasing demand for consumer chips and insufficient production capacity, chip manufacturers are more willing to produce profit margins. High consumer chips.