Bosch Says the Semiconductor Supply Chains In the Car Industry No Longer Work (cnbc.com) 118
An anonymous reader quotes a report from CNBC, written by Sam Shead: German technology and engineering group Bosch, which is the world's largest car-parts supplier, believes semiconductor supply chains in the automotive industry are no longer fit for purpose as the global chip shortage rages on. Harald Kroeger, a member of the Bosch management board, told CNBC's Annette Weisbach in an exclusive interview Monday that supply chains have buckled in the last year as demand for chips in everything from cars to PlayStation 5s and electric toothbrushes has surged worldwide. Coinciding with the surge in demand, several key semiconductor manufacturing sites were forced to halt production, Kroeger said.
In February, a winter storm in Texas caused blackouts at NXP Semiconductors, which is a major provider of automotive and mobile phone chips. In March, there was a fire at a semiconductor plant in Japan operated by Renesas, one of the car industry's biggest chip suppliers. In August, factories in Malaysia have been abandoned as national lockdowns were introduced to reduce the spread of the coronavirus. Volkswagen and BMW cut their production as they struggled to get the chips they needed to build their cars. These companies and semiconductor suppliers should now be looking to figure out how the chip supply chain can be improved, Kroeger said.
"As a team, we need to sit together and ask, for the future operating system is there a better way to have longer lead times," he said. "I think what we need is more stock on some parts [of the supply chain] because some of those semiconductors need six months to be produced. You cannot run on a system [where] every two weeks you get an order. That doesn't work." Semiconductor supply chain issues have been quietly managed by the automotive in the past but now is a time for change, according to Kroeger, who believes demand is only going to increase with the rise of electric vehicles and autonomous vehicles. "Every car that gets smarter needs more semiconductors," Kroeger said. Electric cars need very powerful and efficient semiconductors in order to to get more range out of each kilowatt hour of battery, he added. Kroeger said he expects the chip shortage to extend "way into 2022" adding that he hopes demand remains stable. "We need to ramp up supplies so we can fulfill that demand," he said.
In February, a winter storm in Texas caused blackouts at NXP Semiconductors, which is a major provider of automotive and mobile phone chips. In March, there was a fire at a semiconductor plant in Japan operated by Renesas, one of the car industry's biggest chip suppliers. In August, factories in Malaysia have been abandoned as national lockdowns were introduced to reduce the spread of the coronavirus. Volkswagen and BMW cut their production as they struggled to get the chips they needed to build their cars. These companies and semiconductor suppliers should now be looking to figure out how the chip supply chain can be improved, Kroeger said.
"As a team, we need to sit together and ask, for the future operating system is there a better way to have longer lead times," he said. "I think what we need is more stock on some parts [of the supply chain] because some of those semiconductors need six months to be produced. You cannot run on a system [where] every two weeks you get an order. That doesn't work." Semiconductor supply chain issues have been quietly managed by the automotive in the past but now is a time for change, according to Kroeger, who believes demand is only going to increase with the rise of electric vehicles and autonomous vehicles. "Every car that gets smarter needs more semiconductors," Kroeger said. Electric cars need very powerful and efficient semiconductors in order to to get more range out of each kilowatt hour of battery, he added. Kroeger said he expects the chip shortage to extend "way into 2022" adding that he hopes demand remains stable. "We need to ramp up supplies so we can fulfill that demand," he said.
Dumb cars, please ... (Score:5, Insightful)
The manufacturers have the option of making & selling dumb cars without touch screens, blue LEDs and subscription services.
To get around excessive nanny laws (like requiring reverse cameras and LCD screens) they can be sold as "partially assembled kits" - where you have to screw in the steering wheel by yourself then register-it. The registration rules for self-built cars are much simpler.
While the market for those cars will not be huge, they could still keep the factories open and the income flowing.
Yet the manufacturers choose to shut down the plants.
Re:Dumb cars, please ... (Score:5, Informative)
The manufacturers have the option of making & selling dumb cars without touch screens,
Nope. Since 2018, backup cameras are mandatory on all new cars sold in America. The cameras need to have a display screen.
Other essential semiconductors: Anti-lock brakes, fuel injectors, airbags, etc.
There is no way to build a modern car without semiconductors.
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Nope. Since 2018, backup cameras are mandatory on all new cars sold in America.
A) They can push for the rules to be changed back to alleviate shortages.
B) They can still make such cars for other markets.
It's not like the auto makers are the only players involved, government regulations as you pointed out play a large role, so in theory modification of such should be considered also.
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I wonder how bad things have to get before safety-related features are waived by the Fed and/or states.
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Under the current administration? There would have to be some crisis that raises the dead, who could then cast their vote themeslves.
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Joe is a practical centrist. If the problem starts notably impacting regular Americans, he'd be willing to forgo some safety features. The alternative will be driving used cars from the 1990's that are even more dangerous.
Is this the fake-news Fox meme that Democrats allow dead people to "vote"?
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Is this the fake-news Fox meme that Democrats allow dead people to "vote"?
No, at least not in my mind. It's a comment on the president and large numbers of those in Congress being the walking dead, so old that one must wonder if they aren't just marionettes. Recent polling shows a majority of voters believe the president to be incompetent.
https://pjmedia.com/news-and-p... [pjmedia.com]
The problem is that there's a majority that believe the VP and Speaker, the next two in the line of succession should POTUS be deemed unfit or unavailable, are also not popular. The Democrats may be in the maj
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After bad events (Afghanistan) polls like that always show low numbers. Americans are fickle.
Your anti-age view is a bit disturbing.
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Besides, it's not about safety features and backup cameras. It's tire pressure sensors, anti-lock brake sensors, oil gauge sensors, the electronics in the dashboard, etc. Screens are one thing, analog dials are another.
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Yeah sadly regulatory capture mandates some electronics. But we don't really need 100+ computing elements in a car. Auto manufacturers are recently re-learning the consequences of having things be too modular; there's expense of many forms associated with managing the interactions between too many components.
Short version: yeah it's not feasible to eliminate all semiconductors from vehicles, but we can get back to KISS.
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The whole evolution is towards semiconductors in everything. The internet of things, ''smart' everythings, biosensors, .. a thousand processors in every home. IT's bound to cause supplyside problems . on the other hand, can't they cut back on processors in household appliances instead?
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Other essential semiconductors: Anti-lock brakes, fuel injectors, airbags, etc.
There is no way to build a modern car without semiconductors.
This, not to mention the ECU (Engine Control Unit), which is the reason you don't need a choke any more amongst many other improvements. The infotainment system would probably be the easiest chips to source in a car as it doesn't have to be made well enough to survive in an engine bay for 20 years.
Re:Dumb cars, please ... (Score:4, Funny)
I can't, my breaks are missing their chip.
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FYI, any car with an OBD port (since 1988) has chips in it, not just limited to fancy stuff
Re: Dumb cars, please ... (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, get rid of all the computers in cars.
Bring back
Fall tuneups so your car is more likely to start on a cood winter morning.
Lower gas mileage.
Lower performance. Yes, the engine control module will detect engine knock and adjust timing to get rid of it.
There's lots of features under the hood that require chips. Not just the user visible features you mentioned.
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wtf is a "Fall tuneup"?
Fall tuneup (Re: Dumb cars, please ...) (Score:5, Informative)
wtf is a "Fall tuneup"?
It's a practice from the days before engine control modules where car owners had to take their car in for a tune up, or do it themselves, to make up for summer wear on timing chains and such to that the car was still reliable in the harsh winter conditions. Cold air meant gasoline would not ignite so readily, the oil ran thicker, etc. and so it would take longer to start, more time to warm up and run smooth, etc.
Unless you are over 50 years old or a fan of popular media (books, movies, etc.) from the 1970s and earlier this would be unfamiliar. Around the 1980s there were a lot of changes in car safety and emissions standards which meant more electronics under the hood. It also meant a lot of cars started looking rather plain and boring. One change was to make collisions with pedestrians safer. The hoods were made to be lower and "softer" so if a person was hit they'd land on a hood that was made to break their fall. Air scoops were now verboten and hood ornaments were now just a badge or gone completely. Under the hood was also quite similar as car makers rushed to comply with requirements for unleaded fuel, catalytic converters, and NOx at the tailpipe.
While growing up on a farm we didn't have cable TV, we had satellite TV with only one tuner and Dad had the remote so I got to watch old Clint Eastwood movies or nothing.
"Right turn Clyde"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
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It's a practice from the days before engine control modules where car owners had to take their car in for a tune up, or do it themselves, to make up for summer wear on timing chains and such
There are literally three things that were changed during seasonal tune-ups, carburetor adjustment, ignition timing, and oil weight before multi-weight oils were introduced. Timing chains do not wear that rapidly unless lubrication is insufficient.
Unless you are over 50 years old or a fan of popular media (books, movies, etc.) from the 1970s and earlier this would be unfamiliar.
Apparently facts are unfamiliar to you, which given your posting history, checks out.
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Also clean or replace the plugs, possibly replace the points and condenser. Check the battery (cold cranking amps will soon be in demand). Grease everything.
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None of that shit is special winter shit. It's all stuff you have to do regularly.
My first car was a 1960 Dodge Dart. You didn't have to do literally ANY of that shit special for winter, not fuck with re-tuning it, not anything.
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It did need to be done regularly, and late fall was a good time to do it so it would start easier when cold weather set in.
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What's your problem? I was trying to be helpful on giving a very broad description of the process based on childhood memories, so a bit of leeway on the vagueness shouldn't be too much to ask. The concept of a fall tuneup was something described to me, not something I had to do myself. Are you saying this was not done into the 1970s? If so then what would be more accurate? 1980s? 1960s?
You can be helpful and provide corrections without the attitude. Forgive me for my "errors" because, again, this was
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Regardless, it'
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You missed "twist and go". ECUs make it possible to hop in your car, twist the key and get going. No pumping the gas pedal, no vapor lock, none of this magic "it only starts for me" stuff. About the only time the engine won't start is if something is so wrong - like there's no fuel (just water), or things have gotten so bad mechanically that it's physically seizing up.
There's an old video on the internet where you see a V8 that gets shot up with a high powered rifle. It loses two cylinders before it stalls
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Re: Dumb cars, please ... (Score:3)
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If you're old enough, you would remember checking and filling your battery
This is not something you do for winter, this is something you do all the time. Like, every three months ideally. Sadly most people now have some kind of maintenance-free battery, which actually means "unmaintainable". They need maintenance just as much as any other battery, you simply cannot perform it.
The only car batteries that DON'T need maintenance are ones with solid or paste electrolyte, specifically Optima AGMs or lithium batteries. Both have their advantages (too boring to go into here) but both al
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Add to that list: lots of air pollution. Think LA in the 1970s.
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Telematics
They get to bullshit you into to signing up for marginally needed services by using scare tactics.
They sell your privacy to Madison Avenue.
They get away with it because they also are perfectly willing to provide the authorities with your private information, minus warrant, "just in case" you might commit a "crime" at some later date.
The Reason For The Shortages... (Score:5, Insightful)
It's not just Covid-19.
It's the fact that "just-in-time" manufacturing was kitbashed into everything, without properly understanding it's vulnerabilities and liabilities.
Wendover Productions goes into detail on how this has happened, and why it continues to be a problem. [youtube.com]
Re:The Reason For The Shortages... (Score:5, Insightful)
JIT [Re:The Reason For The Shortages...] (Score:4, Insightful)
But Japan had most their suppliers in their country already. Incidentally, Toyota backed off JIT a bit after the tsunami.
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It's not so much they "backed off", as they adapted to the situation.
And again, that's where all the other companies that grabbed the idea have utterly failed, and are going to go down in screaming flames.
They failed to understand the fundamentals, and only saw dollar signs. As a result, they had no ability to adapt.
Re:JIT [Re:The Reason For The Shortages...] (Score:5, Insightful)
Even stock-pilers are running out of stock. It's not realistic to pile up 2+ years worth.
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Another part of the problem is too few manufacturers who themselves are too fragile because of the same excessive fat trimming.
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Even stock-pilers are running out of stock. It's not realistic to pile up 2+ years worth.
This.
Its a perfect storm of bad conditions, JIT is just at the centre of it.
2019 saw decreased demand so chip fabs scaled back/switched production, then a water shortage in Taiwan, a major plant fire (and I believe a flood as well) beyond that raw material shortage caused in part by the shipping crisis (which again is largely in part to decreased demand in 2019). Under such conditions JIT fails horribly.
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Nope. Just in time manufacturing it was driven by accountants and money.
One of the accounting measures for business performance is ROACE. That's return on average capital employed - effectively how much profit you get for every dollar invested in the business. Just in time manufacturing reduces the amount of parts, and therefore capital, sitting around in warehouses. Clearly this improves your ROACE because you are making the same amount of profit using less capital. I suspect that there are a lot of compa
Re:The Reason For The Shortages... (Score:4, Informative)
They probably knew. It's the short-term get-your-profits-and-run mentality; pump and dump. Aggressive business owners & managers have consistently chosen instant profits over risk aversion. Cyber security, jet shortcuts, fake order incentives (Wells Fargo), no back-up suppliers, pushing addicting meds, exposing employees to Covid, polluting, you name it.
Bad decisions are not punished heavily enough if you are the 1%, encouraging dangerous gambling. Most already have golden parachutes awaiting if they need to bail out when their shit hits the fan. We are the ones left holding the bag.
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Just in Time manufacturing has been employed by Toyota for, like, 50 years, and by American automakers for at least a generation. That doesn't sound like a short-term strategy.
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-Why no, its only a conspiracy theory if it isn't proven.
Re: The Reason For The Shortages... (Score:2)
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If you need reliability, stocking for extreme events is exactly a good practice.
Along with avoiding sole sourcing and sticking as much as possible to less proprietary parts so you can switch suppliers as easily as possible.
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If you needed a special freezer, someone was yanking your chain or the chips were crap.
Also, there is a difference between having 3-5 years worth stacked up in the supply chain and having enough for the entire lifetime of the product.
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So tell me, what was so 'special' about the freezer?
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How very convenient. So nothing special then? No need to be able to liquefy helium? Nothing explodes if the temperature varies more than 0.0001 Celsius degrees? Does it even need to be able to freeze CO2?
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The army of MBAs running business never stops giving us their offal.
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This exactly. This situation was perfectly predictable and many (including many here) predicted it. The MBAs and bean counters out there have a whole lot of crow to eat now (so much that there will probably be a shortage :-). As usual they'll be sticking their hands out now for a bailout while at the same time demanding that we cut the social safety net down just in case they might need more cheap labor next quarter.
Wisdom passed down for generations before us predicted this. It seems there's a lot of hungr [read.gov]
A problem of globalisation (Score:3)
The big change that most people are ignorant of is the fact that today's production systems are a historic anomaly. Normally each empire formed its own trading block, which would be governable by mostly people with same interests. The trade with the rest of the world was in cannonball as much as if not more than goods. Goods had to be smuggled past said cannons for much of interimperial trade. Because to trade with other empires would make you dependent on their production, which would vanish overnight in event of a political crisis with that other empire(s).
What happened after WW2 was US upending this system and being the only major sea faring nation to survive WW2 intact and with more powerful fleet than everyone else combined, instituted a new trade system. US would guarantee trade for everyone, friend and foe. Its navy would patrol the seas, where passage would be free for everyone, so long as they followed a few basic rules. This for example, gave Japan that fought world war 2 for access to resources it needed to grow... literally got more than what it hoped to gain by winning the said world war 2 from losing the war and becoming a part of US led world order. Same is true for countless nations around the globe that were locked by one naval bottleneck or another in their trade.
And this enabled a completely novel approach to manufacturing. You could extract resources in one places, refine thousands of kilometers away, process another few thousand kilometers away, manufacture into a small piece of a large machine another few thousand kilometers away, and pick up thousands of such parts from around the world and ship them to one location to assemble into a complex product like a car. As long as each point had a relatively easy access to a nearby ocean-linked port, you could import and export worldwide with almost no political friction.
But this requires that everything is stable and works as intended. It requires free and open sea lanes, free and open borders for goods, and political and economic systems willing to keep their systems running at every step of the way. This is the point of globalization: system that is extremely efficient, but has a lot of points of failure. The exact opposite of the old imperial system, that was very inefficient in comparison, but you could always force the current bottleneck to produce through political means, because they were a part of your empire. To make an extreme example, coronavirus only has lethality of a couple of percent, whereas bullets fired at workers being made an example of have a much higher lethality.
Many still blame coronavirus epidemic for this, but reality is that the process of rolling globalization back started a good decade ago during Obama's second tenure. That's when for the first time in decades, there was no US Navy carrier battlegroup on station in Middle East, ready to counter any attempts to disrupt the flow of life blood of world economy. Coronavirus merely accelerated the slow return to imperial system of trade by exposing many weak links that remained hidden prior. It did not create it. And while the globalisation is rolled back, we'll have many more such bottlenecks appear in various places, as said rollback stresses the global systems more and more, revealing more and more weak points. Even after coronavirus goes away as the cause. The new stresses are likely to force change slower than coronavirus is forcing it, but the trend is unlikely to reverse. More likely scenario is that we'll have a temporary bounce back of what looks like continuation of globalisation for a year or two after pandemic burns itself out, and then the direction toward more localized economies to better absorb stresses of rollback of globalisation continues.
We're already seeing this in the field of semiconductor manufacturing, where there are now massive investments into new manufacturing capacity and processing capacity within a few "trusted nations" of what will likely form the core of the new trade order.
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>> That's when for the first time in decades, there was no US Navy carrier battlegroup on station in Middle East
citation needed, afaik the Nimitz Carrier group was stationed in Middle East from 2013 on to support Syrian activities
From the people I have spoken with the blockage of the Suez Canal was the initial problem, and was accidental not something a carrier group could resolve
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Well ... one could think of several ways in which a group of aircraft carriers with planes full of bombs and battleships full of ordnance could have unblocked the Suez Canal
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Sure, think a ship inside of the channel to "unblock" the channel.
I wonder why no one had thought about that.
(do you have any clue how much dynamite you would need to blast it out of the channel?)
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Sinking a wrecked ship in the middle of the canal would not have improved the situation.
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Have you tried using google for citations yet? This is my first result:
https://www.defensenews.com/di... [defensenews.com]
As for the rest, Suez blockage isn't what I'm talking about. I'm talking about having maritime trade between empires in the first place. Look at Japanese for example. At no point did they have reliable access to raw materials like oil and rubber before WW2 ended. There were always imperial interests in the way, and trade was simply severed during pre-war period when another empire decided that it's politi
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FYI, your citation is for Dec 30, 2016 which is HARDLY "a good decade ago during Obama's second tenure"
You are apparently grasping at straws after spewing garbage, I get it but why be so snippy about it
Okay, your entire point is, well, garbage since Trump ended up rotating another carrier group in a little while later.
They do that a lot
Also, funny thing about global trade, a pinch point like the Suez can affect trade thousands of miles away
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You do not understand the fundamental basics of WHY US had a carrier uninterrupted on station in Middle East, thousands of kilometers away from home as long as it did. And you don't understand that maritime trade freedom is not about Suez. Suez can be bypassed at fairly minor increase in cost specifically because maritime trade has been freed from imperial political considerations. And the ships that US is guaranteeing the safety of at that extreme cost overwhelmingly go in the direction that is diametrical
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You are trying to apply a tool "Imperial Blockade" to the wrong situation in the wrong century
An Imperial Blockade could potentially starve an opposing nation by limiting their access to resources, the US has attempted this directly in the Cuban Embargo, in order to limit installation of nuclear weapons systems though, not to block trade.
These days, blocking trade to starve nations is accomplished with trade embargoes that are enforced through treaties, not warships, and as such they have proven more effect
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This is amazing. You're actually rejecting the basic tenets of modern geopolitics because... You genuinely think that this is about Trump.
I got nothing. This is too far off the deep end of utter insanity for me to be able to interact with.
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It is called cognitive dissonance, goes hand in hand with your Dunning Kruger
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I'd suggest a mirror, but my past interactions with people who have Trump living in their head rent free in all things political, I don't think your derangement will allow you to understand what I'm talking about.
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Good lord you are butt-hurt, it's not a good look by the way
Here, enjoy a historical listing of blockades [wikipedia.org]
I am sure you want to cry out. SEE SEE there ARE blockades... but please take a closer look
The US is currently engaged in ONE blockade, the continuing embargo on Cuba, which stands as a horrible mistake (based on Nixon not liking Fidel, who initially reached out to US before being rejected and turning to Soviets), which has unjustly punished the people of Cuba because Nixon had a short penis (I kid, he d
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Thanks for sharing that you don't understanding maritime security, rejecting reality, and genuinely believing that the only way to impact trade is blockades.
Not exactly a shocker after demonstrating deep derangement over Trump being supposedly responsible for current draw down of US troop presence globally that started before him.
Did you have anything else to share?
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If you want American labor to be cheaper, you'll have to make living in America cheaper.
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Labour costs are a part of total manufacturing costs. When a single part of the long chain fails because much cheaper labour cannot work for political reasons (i.e. political system locks the country down because it cannot immunize enough people to keep factories running), costs explode.
At which point the cost of "less expensive and less reliable" becomes close to or higher than "more expensive and more reliable".
If only Milton Friedman could see his errors (Score:1)
The Chicago School of Economics did not anticipate just-in-time availability. Thus, missing the calamity of supply-chain risks.
Need more semiconductors made in USA (Score:2, Insightful)
I can recall a shortage of semiconductors being made in USA as a problem going back what must be decades by now. Most anything the government buys has a requirement for having at least two suppliers and one of them must be in the USA. One reason is to keep manufacturers honest, if there's only one supplier then they can just jack up the price and the government has to pay it or stop buying. Another is to maintain supply in case of a flood, fire, epidemic, or whatever at one supplier.
This was a big debate
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Not relevant. The semiconductors in question are partially manufactured in the USA. Many which aren't made in the USA are not made in low cost countries (foundries for semiconductor manufacturers in question are heavily based in Germany and Italy as well). And being in the USA doesn't help a USA car company, not when only 1/3rd of their manufacturing plants are actually in the USA.
There's no such thing as "American" in this equation. These are global car companies with global manufacturing sourcing parts fr
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Over specialization is another problem. (Score:3)
There is an engineering failure here too. There seems to be a tendency in the auto industry to over-specialize their components. They need to take a step back and define chips that they can reuse that may have unused pins in many cases but which can be applied to more situations. The rear hatch and the driver's door may have different part numbers than the other three doors for instance. And then across models these parts will all again be different. The supply chain could be simplified if all of these used the same components but with different connector arrangements.
Was it the 70's when the automobile manufacturers made an effort to reduce the number of types of bolts required to assemble a car? They need to make a similar effort with their electronic components.
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Yes and no. Yes they have a problem with overspecialization, but this has nothing at all to do with the current shortages, which affect far more than just car manufacturers.
Apparently not just chips but passives as well. (Score:1)
Then Bosch are fucking morons (Score:5, Insightful)
...because it's not that 'supply chains don't work'.
It's that you idiots just-in-timed them to oblivion, squeezed out any fraction of a cent of cost representing redundancies and safety nets.
Now you're flummoxed because there are no safety nets?
Dumb fuckers.
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> [ insert any kind of cost here ] them to oblivion, squeezed out any fraction of a cent of cost representing redundancies and safety nets
Sounds to me like you are saying capitalism doesn't work.
Re: Then Bosch are fucking morons (Score:1)
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Well, he's saying that unconstrained capitalism driven by next-quarter's-profits doesn't work. And he's right.
Actually, capitalism has lots of problems, and ignoring them doesn't make them go away. Fixing them might work, but that requires (different) government intervention. One thing that would help is high taxes on short-term profits combined with lower taxes on long term profits. Make it linear, with 100% tax on any profit earned the same day, and 0% profit on anything over 25 years. That would mak
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Not at all.
Capitalism lets businesses make choices. You want to hyper-smooth your supply chains and remote source from prison-barge factories 8000 miles away so you can undercut everyone by a half cent? Great! Then ACCEPT that when things go awry you're fucked.
What you DON'T get to do is then complain that "the system" is broken when you just made stupid choices. Congratulations, you just met Darwin.
On the other hand, businesses that local-source might have slightly higher prices, but are much more dura
Old cars are better. (Score:1)
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Has more to do with the idiot behind the wheel than the car.
If you mean that whether you die is more up to whether you're an idiot or not than how the car is built, that might be true. But it's frankly entirely provable that modern cars are safer for the occupants in a crash than the old ones were, and even if you're a genius you can still get creamed by an idiot.
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Plenty fewer.
The automotive guys are figuring this out now? (Score:2)
Someone in the business once said âoechips are not tyres,â now these guys get it?
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Bosch owns a bunch of chip fabs, they are probably not just now figuring this out.
Nor should anybody suppose that they're saying this to help others, or to help the industry.
They're trying to encourage customers to order 6 months or more ahead of time, and to want suppliers who can guarantee that. That means no ICs from fabless design companies. It means shifting to suppliers like Bosch...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
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The message is not for the good of mankind. However, they are not wrong. If you JIT stuff you can get from anywhere, that's sustainable. If you JIT all the things, you will get caught out.
Don't Need Chip For So Many Things (Score:2)
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Most of these things lasted longer and were much more easily repaired when they didn't have ICs in them.
Built-in obsolescence. You have to keep the consumers buying the new shiny, because that keeps the profits flowing. Anybody who designs a car that lasts a lifetime will probably get locked up as a dangerous subversive, and don't you dare try to make do and mend, because that would infringe the right of multinational corporations to make profits from selling you new stuff.
Of course there is progress in engineering. I would be out of a job if there were not improvements to be made. But there is a hell of a di
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You realistically need a chip to cost-effectively produce a modern toaster which can detect moisture. If all you want it to do is toast for a period of time and turn off, you don't need any chip at all, though you will need a capacitor (although you could do the job with a bimetallic strip, it would behave differently depending on the time since the last toasting event.)
A normal light switch never had a chip and still doesn't. A wireless switch or an efficient dimmer switch (which is not simply throwing awa
Car industry is not first in line (Score:3)
Car manufacturers have long (and justifiably) had the attitude that they comprised the most important customers their suppliers cater to. This gave them the feeling that, even if semiconductors were in short supply, theirs would not be the industry having to make do without chips.
Obviously, that belief was unfounded.
Every 2 weeks works just fine, it's just... (Score:2)
Getting a delivery of parts every 2 weeks works just fine. The problem with the supply chain is that there isn't anything in the chain behind that delivery. What they need is some depot in the chain that ships out a delivery every 2 weeks, gets a delivery every 2 weeks to replace what they shipped out, and has shelves full of product so they can keep shipping out every 2 weeks for at least a few months even if they don't get any shipments in. Something called, oh, what was it, a warehouse?
Re: (Score:2)
No, the moral of this story is that it DOES NOT work fine if that's your whole process. As has been pointed out in these stories before, Toyota invented JIT manufacturing as we know it today, and what they discovered is that it doesn't work unless you have a complex working relationship with your suppliers where you are privy to their internal workings and you know when shortages are impending, and can order ahead of time to build up stock in order to ride it out. And that only works when shortages are fore
Toilet roll shortage applied to semiconductors (Score:2)
I think what Bosch are saying is that the logistics of manufacturing and delivering semiconductors is fragile. If anything upsets the process, such as factories not working as well as they used to, due to pandemic related restrictions for example, then there is not just a bit of a slow down, but a major collapse.
I am reminded of the toilet roll shortage, that occurred during the first pandemic-related lockdown (this is in the UK). The disease did not give you the shits, but toilet roll flew off the supermar
Re: (Score:2)
The disease did not give you the shits
Presentation
The signs and symptoms of COVID-19 present at illness onset vary, but over the course of the disease many people with COVID-19 will experience the following:(1,4-9)
[...]
* Diarrhea
It would really help if you knew what the fuck you were talking about. Thanks.
Re: (Score:2)
You totally missed the point. I agree that my statement that Covid-19 does not give you the shits is not strictly correct, but I would suggest that diarrhoea is not a primary symptom. Common symptoms of Covid-19 infection include a persistent cough, fever, breathing difficulties, fatigue, and loss of sense of smell. I don't recall seeing diarrhoea as an indicator on any health advice. If we were talking about Dysentry, then you would have a point.
The fact that Covid-19 infection can cause diarrhoea is not w
Bosch just trying to divert attention (Score:2)
Bosch are running way behind on orders, far more than can be justified by covid. They are going to get slaughtered marketshare wise.