Automotive semis are transitioning from the near-anarchy of dozens of independent vendors selling hundreds of discrete parts to platforms powering cars’ major systems. Great news for the big analog companies, if they can make the leap to digital.
AI may wipe out humanity someday, but right now it is doing wonders for semis stocks.
Global Foundries’s future lays in bringing the fabless business model to the analog industry. The transition to 300mm wafers could prove a big catalyst for that.
Global Foundries makes mixed-signal chips on trailing edge processes for use in industrial, automotive and wireless networks. So does TI. Maybe we should start to think of GF as an analog semis company.
We think there will be a few more legs of semis consolidation. So we compiled a list of 5 semis companies who we think will survive:
1. ADI & TI
2. QCOM
3. NVDA
4. Some chip company from China
5. The smoldering remains of Intel, probably owned by others.
This downturn in semis is different from past cycles in that each segment seems to be taking a beating at different times. This cycle is serial, not parallel, and we probably need to see all of that play out before the sector starts to recover.
5 chip companies revisited – With elevated stock prices and cheap debt the large companies have the means to further consolidate the industry. But this time even the biggest companies may be targets.
Heading into MWC, Qualcomm looks well positioned for 5G modems, but the industry is moving towards greater vertical integration, with internal chip suppliers. And as always, Apple remains an important wild card.
Yesterday, Avago announced it was going to acquire Broadcom. These are both big companies, and their combination puts them squarely into the top five of global chip companies. As I mentioned in […]