Huawei Blames US for Global Chip Supply Crunch (nikkei.com) 55
Huawei has blamed the U.S. for the chip crunch rocking the global tech industry, saying Washington's sanctions against Chinese companies have spurred panic buying of semiconductors and other supplies. From a report: "Because of the U.S. sanctions against Huawei, we have seen panic stockpiling among global companies, especially the Chinese ones. In the past, companies were barely stockpiling, but now they are building up three or six months' worth of inventory ... and that has disrupted the whole system," Rotating Chairman Eric Xu said at the company's 18th Huawei Analyst Summit. The U.S. has placed Huawei and other Chinese tech companies on trade blacklists that restrict their access to American technology, citing national security risks. "Clearly the unwarranted U.S. sanctions against Huawei and other [Chinese] companies are creating an industry-wide supply shortage, and this could even trigger a new global economic crisis," Xu added. Xu's remarks come hours before the White House plans to host a summit aimed at addressing the chip shortage, with an emphasis on its impact on the automotive industry. Dozens of executives from U.S., Asian and European tech companies and automakers -- including General Motors, Ford, Google, Intel, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co., Samsung Electronics, and NXP -- are slated to attend the event. White House officials have already acknowledged that the chip shortage may be difficult to solve in the short term.
Huawei got what all of China deserves (Score:2, Insightful)
The Chinese Communist Party is the second worst actor on the international scene right now.
Look at how Hong Kong immediately turned into a repressive hellscape immediately after China took control. What a tragic end to what had once been one of the true wonders of the modern world.
And chock one more victory up to ultra-sleazy Chinese officials.
It's time to teach China a very strong lesson. Not with incompetence and racism, but with strong diplomacy backed by our military strength.
If China thinks it can stea
Re: Huawei got what all of China deserves (Score:2)
Said A. coward
How convenient (Score:1)
Re:Huawei got what all of China deserves (Score:5, Interesting)
I would say China is one of the United States biggest threat against our interests. But they are some really bad actors on the international scene that would make China look like a warm and friendly government.
I am not saying China doesn't have a lot of Human Right Problems, and they are the good guys. But the United State Too has its own problems that can be pointed to right back to us. But still they are other countries, who level of human rights is just horrendous.
The sad truth is Human Rights isn't big on the schedule of international politics, it is only brought up as a way to help with the local propaganda to have backing towards aggressive international policy.
China is a big trading partner and competitor where a lot of its actions are against American and Western Self Interests, so Western Countries need to be tough on them, but they just use what China has for Human Right Violations as just Political tools for the general public to make sure we feel justified being so tough on the nation.
They are countries that we don't trade much with, and we more or less will just sit back and let everyone kill each other off, because they have little to offer to US, and don't pose any real threat. If we really cared about human rights we would be very involved with a lot of countries.
Now the United States has its problems too. Which countries like China and Russia will point at us and ignore their issues to show their general public how bad we really are.
Re:Huawei got what all of China deserves (Score:4, Insightful)
The question is what are you going to do about it.
You could try a trade war, but we have seen how that doesn't work and hurts you as more than them. You could try an actual war, but nobody wants that.
Cut them off? Then we have no influence, and it hurts us a lot.
So what's left? Try to bring them on-side with the possibility of trade, with the requirement to meet certain standards like no forced labour and generally high standards for employees. That does work. It takes a long time but look at manufacturing in China now; factory jobs are sought-after and conditions have improved a lot. Having a nice clean factory with well looked after employees has become a selling point.
We can also compete, e.g. I think it's a good idea to set up fabs in the EU and US. As well as redundancy and security it also means that there is competition on things like human rights.
It sucks that we can't just fix it, but we can't.
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Yeah. All they do are make copycat brands.
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Me, personally the best I can do, is vote for officials that have some experience with international diplomacy.
However what we as a country can do probably isn't the quick fix, but really a slow process of diversifying our supply chains, investing into local manufacturing, as well manufacturing in countries that are reliable. So if Chips can be Made in the United States, Canada, UK, France Germany, Japan, South Korea, as well as China and India. As well see if some African Countries may want to be investe
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"So what's left? Try to bring them on-side with the possibility of trade, with the requirement to meet certain standards like no forced labour and generally high standards for employees. That does work. It takes a long time ..."
How much does that kind of thing work. Are other factors behind the change. Would you think other countries can change the 'US industrial prison complex', "bring them on-side with the possibility of trade, with the requirement to meet certain standards ...".
"but look at manufacturing
flashbacks (Score:1)
flashbacks to the Arab Oil Embargo of the early 70's.
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I dont mean to imply its deliberate I COULD be, but an article yesterday showed PC sales way up, so demand IS higher. Im awaiting GM to announce their new truck that now has a "non electronic, much simpler engine management system" and they bring back the carb!
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Renewable Energy (Score:3)
Renewable Chips. (Score:2)
Going to be hard making their own. [npr.org]
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You should read about Hector Ruiz and Intel Capital. Google for it.
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We want cheap vs robust.
It is a tough sell to promote paying more money for a more robust system. Why pay $1,750 for a laptop that has Chips from manufacturers that are spread across the world, where you can pay $1,250 for a laptop of the same speed and performance, with chips from one country that we have a shaky relationship with.
For the consumer, they are just going to get the lower price product. The company wants to target the customer. So this process drops robustness in supply chain towards being
Slight problem with that theory. (Score:3)
"Clearly the unwarranted U.S. sanctions against Huawei and other [Chinese] companies are creating an industry-wide supply shortage
The sanctions only apply to U.S. companies selling to China. Most ICs are not produced by U.S. companies. The big ones are TI, Microchip, Qualcomm, Intel, and AMD. Meanwhile, there are plenty of non-U.S. companies like NXP, STM, Samsung, Sony, and others that still deal with China.
Huawei is just upset that it cannot get a supply of Qualcomm chips to put in their smartphones.
Re:Slight problem with that theory. (Score:4, Informative)
Re: Slight problem with that theory. (Score:4, Interesting)
Slight problem with cars. (Score:2)
...or their self-driving cars.
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Re:Slight problem with that theory. (Score:4, Informative)
The reason why many foreign companies/countries were getting pissed off at the US, was because US companies were getting exemptions but foreign companies weren't getting exemptions or deliberations regarding the exemptions were being delayed. Therefore US companies were making money selling to China, while foreign companies were potentially getting sanctioned if they proceeded with sales.
Re:Slight problem with that theory. (Score:4, Interesting)
It doesn't matter that the ICs aren't produced by US companies.
The problem is that the US reach in the financial system is quite broad and deep. As an example, the US has shown it is willing and able to prevent Europe (an economy of roughly the same size as the US) from doing any trading of significance with Iran despite their stated desire to do so. How? It places sanctions on any entity trading in US dollars to Iran. This is basically, well, every major entity in the world. So companies cannot at the same time trade on the world markets (which are basically all denominated in dollars) and do trading against the US's current trade policy. This applies to trade with China as well - including things like trading patent rights (in the high-tech world this is quite important).
For now, it is with just a few targeted Chinese companies. Companies can of course make a choice to follow US sanctions or trade solely with China. Any company that doesn't do the majority of their business in China (or are on the sanctions list themselves) will likely choose to obey the US sanctions (with some cheating at the margins...). China is a lot bigger than Iran, so if the trade disputes expand, you might see more and more companies forced to choose one side or another (and more would choose China than chose Iran).
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wow, shocker (Score:2)
Simple solution, more sanctions (Score:2)
If their projected sales plummet, all that inventory with high market prices will end up on the market.
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Which countries will join those sanctions? Do you think you can convince them? Second, increased global isolation will eventually lead to World War III which would not turn out as great for everyone like WWI and WWII. We are far better off using more subtle tactics. Also, why are we ignoring China as a market? Germany has trade parity and sometimes surplus with China in spite of having free trade with them. In fact, the average German buys MORE from China than the average American, yet Germany has trade par
Pot calling kettle black... (Score:1, Insightful)
All Chinese countries have to have members of the government/CCP as part of the board. It would be like the US having CIA, DHS, NSA, or FBI members as directors who can override all decisions in any company on US soil.
Hint: China makes all those chips. A shortage for stuff made on their soil is not the US's problem, it is China's propaganda.
What really needs to happen is that chipmaking plants need to be created in the West. Doesn't have to be the US, but can be Europe, Canada, or locations where compan
Re:Pot calling kettle black... (Score:5, Interesting)
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When all your chips are in one basket... (Score:2)
That's what you get. Globalization is great, the outsourcing aspect of labor I'm sure is great and cheap for many companies, until national interests take precedence (nefarious or not). And what's the contingency plan in these cases? Ah yeah, there isn't one.
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One would hope... But I think the roles are already filled, as Chinese possibly already have their fair share of inept leeches with see people are replaceable resources instead of human beings
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The chips are in many baskets. Just not "our" basket ("our" can be pretty much any group you wish to define).
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It's interesting to see the lists here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
USA dominates the companies list, whereas Asia completely dominates the production/exports. Who has exactly the upper hand here? If the architects and the builders (with blueprints) have an argument, who's going to be homeless if things go south?
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China just assembles most of it into an end consumer product because they have cheap labor and the investment into the infrastructure to enable that production was done years or even decades ago.
The issue is that the pandemic created a spike in demand
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I didn't know that US does much fabrication. That's something. In the pandemic though, with a demand spike, who suffers the greatest effect of shortages you think? Certainly not the ones who assemble the parts. If somebody is going to have access to the finished product first, it's going to be the ones at the end of the supply chain, just before transport/consumers
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Except Huawei can move their product to the market in China easily.
They can easily sell all their stockpile.
The same applies to other sanctioned companies in China.
let me correct that (Score:1)