Asma, the Netherlands, the world's most advanced supplier of chip equipment, warned on Wednesday that Europe could fall into a position where it has no influence in the global semiconductor sector if no urgent action is taken to revive the semiconductor industry.
Peter Wennink, the company's chief executive, also believes that there is no risk of oversupply in the global chip industry in the short term.
At present, there is no risk of chip surplus.
At a time when the global "lack of core" continues to haunt many industries, the development of semiconductor industry has become the consensus of many countries and regions in the world.
In a letter to investors on Wednesday local time, Peter Wennink predicted that capital spending on chips in China, the European Union, Japan, South Korea and the United States is expected to double this year from $150 billion in 2021.
"We realise that this has raised concerns about potential oversupply," he said. However, we believe that the obvious growth prospects in the semiconductor industry do require a significant increase in capacity. "
He also said he believed the chip industry would try to avoid oversupply: "Industry partners will make enough efforts to maintain a barrier-free and efficient innovation ecosystem."
Asmai calls on Europe to improve the whole chip industry chain
As a Dutch company, Asmer is particularly concerned about the development of the semiconductor industry in Europe. In particular, they pointed out the need for Europe to improve the entire chip industry chain from top to bottom, including chip components and electronics. Asmai also called on Europe to establish a broad cross-industry alliance and collectively discuss a "long-term semiconductor innovation roadmap" as soon as possible.
"if no action is taken, European semiconductor capacity (as a share of the world) will fall below 4 per cent, which will make it almost irrelevant globally," the company warned. "
Asmer's warning follows the submission of the Chip Bill by the European Commission on Tuesday. The bill proposes a series of measures to stimulate the development of the semiconductor industry, including a substantial increase in government subsidies to attract overseas semiconductor companies such as Intel to set up semiconductor factories in Europe, with the aim of quadrupling semiconductor production capacity in Europe. and increase its share of global output from less than 10 per cent at present to 20 per cent by 2030.
"the important thing about the Chip Act is that we send a clear signal that Europe is open to business," a senior European Commission official said on Tuesday. We have set out our terms, and now [chipmakers] have clear legal certainty about how we will treat their projects. "
The European chip industry has lagged far behind.
However, Asmai believes that the bill is far from enough to boost the European chip industry. For Europe, both the upstream production capacity of the chip industry and the downstream demand of the chip industry lag far behind the United States and Asia.
For example, with the exception of a few companies such as Bosch, there are not many companies in Europe that can create enough demand for edge computing. However, it is widely expected that by 2030, the growth of global demand for the chip industry will be driven mainly by the growth of demand for marginal data processing, such as self-driving cars. The European Commission predicts that the relative proportion of demand generated by edge computing and cloud computing will reverse by the end of the century, from the current 20:80 to 80:20.
According to Asma, Bosch is currently the largest buyer of semiconductors in Europe and the leading European company in edge computing, followed by (Continental), an auto parts supplier, which buys far more chips than more traditional technology companies such as Ericsson.
Asmai also said that over the past 20 years, European chipmakers have almost stopped investing in advanced manufacturing capacity and have outsourced production of more advanced chip designs to outside factories such as TSMC. This means that Europe clearly lacks expertise and needs to build a new manufacturing ecosystem almost from scratch.
There needs to be a significant increase in stimulus and alliances.
In terms of fiscal stimulus, the EU currently needs $66 billion in capital spending to maintain its current 8 per cent share of global capacity, while Asmer estimates that the EU must significantly increase capital spending to $264 billion to achieve the goal of quadrupling output.
"therefore, [governments] need to strongly encourage foreign investment in advanced European fabs to reduce the associated high risks," Asmer warned. If European policymakers do not provide sufficient incentives, these advanced wafers will be built elsewhere. "
Asmai also believes that if the EU is to achieve this ambition, the only way is for all stakeholders to work together to develop a long-term strategy. The alliance will require experts from chipmakers, suppliers, research institutions and the wider manufacturing sector, as well as senior decision makers.
It suggested that the membership of the alliance should be broad and that any chipmaker willing to invest and establish operations in Europe should be allowed to join, regardless of their headquarters.
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