The shortage of car chips is easing, but smartphones will be the next victim.

A number of industry executives and economists believe that the global semiconductor shortage is likely to last until 2022, and the chip shortage has triggered repeated shutdowns by carmakers, which will then hit smartphone production and may lead to a shortage of home appliances and industrial equipment in the future.

"the auto industry has been the most affected this year, but supply in the industry is likely to improve soon," said Iris Pang, chief economist for ING Greater China. He predicts that smartphone makers will be the next area to face interference.

"A number of semiconductor companies are making chips tailored to cars, so the shortage of chips for cars should be resolved within a few weeks, but the shortage of chips for other electronic products still exists," Pang added, adding that this could delay shipments of some new models of smartphones.

Mobile phone chips bottomed out, shipments may shrink in the second quarter

Many mobile phone manufacturers stockpiled key components about six months ago, but those inventories have been greatly reduced. For Samsung Electronics, the world's largest smartphone maker, problems with the procurement of key components led to a 20 per cent drop in shipments compared with the previous quarter. Google also said its Pixel 5a 5G phones are only available in the United States and Japan.

However, the impact of chip shortage on various mobile phone manufacturers is high and low. More than 80% of the smartphone industry is still severely affected by chip shortages, according to industry analysts. In the first quarter of 2021, global smartphone shipments surged 20 per cent from the same period last year and 14 per cent from the same period in 2019, although shipments in the second quarter are expected to fall 10 per cent from the first quarter.

A Samsung spokesman said: "We are keeping a close eye on the challenges facing the industry as a whole and are doing our best to minimize the impact on our business." Across the industry, handset makers have also had to cope with continuing outbreaks, not only curbing consumer spending, but also affecting production in major production centres in India and Vietnam.

The impact continues, but it is good for the chip industry.

Adam Khan, founder of AKHAN Semiconductor, said the chip supply crunch was likely to last into the second quarter of 2022, stressing that "this period is conservative, and in fact the shortage may last longer and have a greater impact."

Andrew Feldman, chief executive of chip startup Cerebras Systems, agrees, adding that suppliers have up to 32 weeks to deliver new chips and components.

Pang said that even if computers currently trying to recycle cryptocurrency mining, the shortage will not go away. One-off purchases to meet job needs and continued demand for smartphones and other electronic products have driven higher demand for chips and are expected to stimulate investment and growth in the chip industry.

As chip giants such as TSMC and Intel compete to increase production, ASML, the global lithography machine leader, boosted its sales prospects this week due to strong orders. The company expects net sales to reach 52-5.4 billion euros in the third quarter of this year, and gross profit margin will also rise to 51% 52% range.

Dan Hutcheson, CEO of VLSI Research, which specializes in the chip industry, said that the chip industry is likely to grow by 21% to 25% in 2021, which will be the industry's best performance since 2010.

Since the beginning of 2021, the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index (16%) has outperformed the NASDAQ Composite Index (13%).