Views: 3 Author: Site Editor Publish Time: 2018-07-25 Origin: Site
Affected by the rising tide, chip multilayer ceramic capacitors (MLCC) are becoming more and more familiar to people outside the industry. Its price has risen rapidly since 2017. At the peak, the spot price of MLCC, such as 0603 and 0402, is even higher than 10 times before the rise. The high price of basic components also inevitably affects the upstream and downstream sectors.
The supply and demand gap still exists, and the rising market continues:
As the basic component of electronic products, MLCC has the advantages of small size, wide frequency range and long life. It is one of the largest and fastest-growing passive components in the world. It is widely used in automatic control instruments, computers, mobile phones and digital home appliances. , automotive electronics and other industries. In particular, in recent years, with the thin and lighter smartphones and the development of electronic and networked automobiles, the demand for ultra-miniature MLCCs has increased, but it has also become one of the reasons for the price increase of this round of MLCC.
Since 2017, passive components have entered the price increase cycle, and manufacturers have issued price increases, especially in the absence of MLCC shortages. According to related reports, the MLCC produced by several manufacturers in Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan in China has been increasing in price this year, and it has been continuously, with a 20% to 50% increase every time. On July 6th, the global MLCC leading Murata Manufacturing Co., Ltd. issued a price increase letter, ranging from 50% to 500%, and the increase was determined according to different series of materials. It is reported that Murata will increase the price of MLCC by 20% to 30% in the near future. Taiyo Yuden is also negotiating prices with customers, and Taiwanese manufacturers will follow up later this year.
For the current price trend, the industry's understanding is relatively consistent, the rising market will continue for some time, some forecast until the third quarter of 2019, and some believe that it will continue until 2020. Recently, Taiwan’s passive component maker Guoju pointed out that MLCC supply and demand continued to be tight, the company’s MLCC “order-to-bill ratio” was more than 2 times, and the machine and equipment required for the expansion of new capacity required 18 months to be delivered. On the market demand, the overall supply and demand gap of passive components is estimated. By 2019, I am afraid there is still no solution.
Constant impact, or accelerate downstream updates:
The increase in the price of this round of MLCC is mainly caused by the imbalance between supply and demand. As the car is moving toward intelligent and electronic development, communication devices such as smart phones are constantly moving towards thinner and lighter, which has increased the demand for MLCC. For some time, the expansion of capacitor manufacturers has been relatively conservative, and the lack of new capacity has led to the current tight supply and the rising prices.
He Yinshan, chief product manager of Dongfeng Automotive Electronics Co., Ltd., pointed out that many manufacturers choose to convert production capacity into areas with high demand and high returns. Automobiles are one of the high-yield areas. This has also led to the transformation of some enterprises, shifting the ordinary MLCC production capacity to high-margin areas such as automobiles. According to Murata (Murata), the number of MLCCs used in electric vehicles is 2,700 to 3,100, and they are all high-end products. The traditional fuel-vehicle power system uses 450 to 600 MLCCs, all of which are conventional models.
The use of smartphone stand-alone MLCC is also growing. Take the iPhone as an example. The iPhone 5S uses 400 MLCCs alone, 780 for iPhone 6, 850 for iPhone 7, 1000 for iPhone 8, and 1100 for iPhone X, and the proportion of high-end MLCC continues to grow.
Yu Yong, chief technology officer of Yuyang Technology, pointed out that from the perspective of industry trends, the traditional electronics industry, including the IT industry, the communications industry, and the video industry, are intertwined. In the era of mobile internet, the functions of home appliances and PCs are integrated into intelligent communication terminals. The development of intelligent terminals requires ultra-microelectronic components, and MLCC is one of the most important products.
From the perspective of total demand, according to Boss data forecast, the global MLCC demand in 2017 is 400 billion, and the market space is about 10 billion US dollars. It is expected that the demand for MLCC will expand to 4.8 trillion in 2020, and the market space will reach 115. One hundred million U.S. dollars.
Regardless of the reason for the price increase, this trend is undoubtedly a positive for passive component manufacturers, and related raw materials and equipment manufacturers will also benefit. For downstream manufacturers, this wave of price increases may not be all negative. When reporters communicated with people in the industry, they heard such news: At present, the most shortcomings of MLCC are products such as 0402 and 0603, and some manufacturers have begun to adopt the 0201 replacement technology to solve the shortage problem. Previously 0201 was mainly used on smartphones. If you want to use the 0201 on your notebook, tablet or other electronic products, you need to modify the PCB motherboard plan. In the past, such a cycle was long, and the incentives for manufacturers to update their designs were insufficient. The price increase has accelerated this process.
MLCC has different specifications such as 3216, 2012, 1608, 1206, 1005, 0805, 0603, 0402, 0201, 01005, etc. The smaller the value, the smaller the size and the lighter and thinner the product. They correspond to different markets and are applied to products of different generations, not completely replaced. However, in the foreseeable future, ultra-small MLCCs will dominate the market.
To advance to high-end, you should not miss the opportunity window:
At present, companies such as Murata, TDK, Taiyo Yuden, Samsung Electric, and Guoju, etc., monopolize the market of around 85% of the global MLCC. Mainland China MLCC manufacturers are mainly Fenghua Hi-Tech and Yuyang Technology. However, with the fact that Murata's solar lure and other products gradually shift their focus to the market for vehicles, domestic manufacturers will have more opportunities to undertake the field of Japanese companies' exit, which will accelerate the development of domestic MLCC manufacturers and the process of advancing toward high-end. .
According to Xiang Yong's introduction, as early as 2008, Yuyang began to deploy the technology and production line of 0201 series products, and realized engineering and industrialization. After several years of unremitting efforts, Yuyang Technology's total investment in the MLCC product line reached 130 million yuan, gradually forming a total annual production capacity of about 90 billion. In recent years, the cumulative production and sales of 197.24 billion, completed the supply of 490 million smart phones, the domestic market share increased to 31.5%.
Wang Jinquan, president of Fenghua Hi-Tech, said that thanks to the recent increase in MLCC prices, the company will transform high-end fields such as automotive electronics, high-end communications and military industry through internal reforms and outreach mergers and acquisitions. The company is implementing a quality improvement plan. The first step is to use the company's current capacity utilization rate to achieve higher standards. Then, we will benchmark the Japanese products, from product performance to production process management, and improve product quality step by step.
When talking about the challenges that will be faced in the development of high-end, Xiang Yong believes that the biggest development bottleneck that Yuyang Technology has faced in recent years is the lack of funds. Similar to integrated circuits, MLCC is also a high-tech, capital-intensive industry. Due to the lack of funds, even if the company made breakthroughs in technology, it is difficult to expand production capacity at a time, and it is difficult to compete with international manufacturers.
Among the major categories of microelectronics and basic component products, integrated circuits, optical devices, passive components, and the like are included. MLCC is one of the key products and the foundation of the electronic information technology industry. At present, the state has paid great attention to the integrated circuit industry, but the input into the components and other fields is obviously insufficient. Therefore, it calls for more attention in the field of electronic components to solve the funding bottleneck problem in industrial development.
