The core reason is that supply exceeds demand and there is a global shortage of cores.
Some time ago, the boss of the previous company asked me about the previous products, and took advantage of the opportunity to talk about what everyone is doing recently, how they are doing and so on.
Hearing the tone of the boss, I feel weak. In fact, I don’t need him to say it. I know that the company has been losing money in the past few years, and it is even more unspeakable in recent years.
I resigned from there about 3 years ago and helped the company make 2 finished products. The customer was just about to mass-produce when the epidemic came.
Therefore, the reason for leaving was that I didn't want to drag the company down, because it was difficult to pay wages at that time.
Of course, I'm not that great, and I'm also afraid that the company's wage arrears will affect my life, after all, I also have a family.
I have stayed with the company for a few years, and the company’s products are basically developed by me, and I can’t open my mouth to fire my boss. In order to make everyone more decent, I offered to resign.
The epidemic has only just begun, and the ensuing skyrocketing chip prices have made things worse. Even the boss with a mine at home cannot withstand this kind of shock.
The low-end STM32 was only a few dollars, but later it rose to more than 100, more than ten times.
In the past, it was eager for customers to place an order, but now it is burning incense and worshiping Buddha to hope that customers will not place an order.
For many customers, you will definitely not accept a price increase of more than 10 times with him. If you don’t do this, the customer may be lost.
It's embarrassing and painful. Some companies simply stop selling products and make more money selling chips in stock.
Friends who have bought cars in the past two years probably know it very well. It used to be a maximum of 3 months to deliver a car, but it is normal for you to wait for 6 or 7 months in the past two years.
For example, many of BYD's cars have been produced, but they lack chips.
Therefore, not only the price of Raspberry Pi has increased, but basically all chips have also increased.
What causes chip prices to rise?
1. Epidemic
This is a global disaster, causing many companies to stop production and stop production, the loss of intermediate time and various chain effects, resulting in a serious shortage of chips, and the supply exceeds demand.
Although our country is under control, European countries are also one of the main producers of chips.
2. Spot merchants hoard goods
Some merchants bought a large number of spot chips in the early stage, hoarded them maliciously, caused the market to be out of stock, and then sold them at a high price, and some sold fake chips.
3. Rising raw material prices
In 2019, there was a shortage of raw material "sand". Sand contains silicon, which is the basic material for manufacturing semiconductor devices. This has led to price increases in the entire industrial chain from sand to chips.
4. The impact of international relations
Many high-end chips now come from abroad.
Now for the technological advancement of chips, how many nanometers are generally used to evaluate.
It refers to the characteristic size of the chip manufacturing process. We often say how many nanometers a chip refers to.
The smaller the chip size, the higher the transistor density inside the chip and the stronger the performance.
It can be simply understood that the smaller the chip size and the higher the transistor density, the more advanced the chip.
At present, TSMC is the most powerful manufacturer of chips in the world, and the energy production is now 5 nanometers.
We do not have such a sophisticated lithography machine yet, and high-end chips cannot be fully localized.
5. Mismatch between capacity and demand
Now more and more products are becoming smart, such as tablets, watches, bracelets, earphones, cars and so on.
In the global epidemic, everyone is isolated and working at home, which has instead spawned the demand for electronic products.
Every electronic product uses a lot of chips, and it is not easy to expand production capacity, resulting in a shortage of chips in a short period of time.
Therefore, if you have the conditions to make a living in the upper reaches of the industrial chain, it will definitely be the best.
If you have no conditions, you can only go down the industrial chain step by step, find a link that can maximize your own conditions and benefits, and generally you will not be hungry.