Credit: DIGITIMES
The customers of Taiwanese MCU makers are stockpiling, and MCU deliveries will proceed despite high buy inventories. IC design houses have promised to make chips at foundries, and now want to sell those chips over the long term to notebook makers. Thanks in part to 28nm production, UMC has a lucrative long-term agreement with Samsung that will move image processors and display driver ICs.
Taiwan MCU suppliers see customers start stockpiling: Taiwan-based MCU suppliers have seen their customers start stockpiling amid unstable international conditions, with clear order visibility extended to the end of the second quarter. MCU makers have secured more capacity support from foundry houses than they had in 2021, and because backend partners are delivering excellent support, the MCU makers will ship their products with great effectiveness.
IC design houses seeking long-term contracts with notebook clients: Taiwan-based IC design houses are striving to reach long-term supply agreements with their notebook customers to support the order commitments required by their foundry partners. IC design houses have had to sign long-term capacity utilization pacts to get sufficient capacity supply from foundry partners, and since late in the second half of 2021 they have negotiated with clients regarding possible long-term supply contracts needed to enable stable utilization of foundry capacity already in hand.
UMC negotiates higher quotes for new contract with Samsung: Pure-play foundry United Microelectronics (UMC) has managed to negotiate higher quotes for a new, long-term agreement (LTA) it struck with Samsung Electronics. The new LTA that UMC has secured from Samsung demands 28nm process manufacturing. Samsung contracts UMC to fabricate image signal processors and OLED display driver ICs.
