[Weekly Podcast] Shortage of semiconductors hitting IT companies and former quarters

This week, major tech companies unified their quarterly results. First, according to the first quarter settlement of Alphabet, Google’s parent company, Alphabet’s total sales increased by 34% year-on-year to $55.3 billion, and net profit reached $17.9 billion, 2.6 times that of the previous year.

In the first quarter’s settlement, Alphabet said it earned $55.3 billion in revenue, over 34% year-on-year, and net profit reached $17.9 billion, 2.6 times that of the previous year. In addition, earnings per share were $26.29, exceeding the monthly forecast.

Meanwhile, Microsoft reported an increase in sales and operating profit in this financial report, stating that its third quarter revenue was $41.7 billion, a 19% increase from the same period last year and its operating profit was $17 billion, a 31% increase from the same period last year. The 19% increase over the previous year is the largest growth rate since 2018. The most revenue growth was in the intelligent cloud sector, which was $11.5 billion, up 23% year-on-year.

In addition, Apple’s sales for this quarter reached a record high of $89 billion in second-quarter sales, a 54% increase from the same period last year. Samsung Electronics’ quarterly sales also increased 18% year-on-year to 65.39 trillion won, and operating profit increased 45% to 9.38 trillion won.

Meanwhile, the COVID-19 pandemic is seriously damaging the global economy, while the economy is gradually recovering as the vaccine advances. However, it is said that the shortage of semiconductors, which is essential in many industries, is causing production bottlenecks, and among them, automobiles have been greatly affected. According to market research firm IHS Market, the cost of semiconductors accounted for in cars produced in 2000 was 18%, but it is reaching 40% in 2020.

Factors in the semiconductor shortage include factory closures due to pandemic, disruption in transportation due to global container shortage, and confrontation between China and the United States. One analyst says he has never seen such a serious shortage of semiconductors over the past 30 years, and he expects not to recover easily. For the time being, semiconductor demand is expected to continue to exceed supply.

Next news. Apple introduced the iOS 14.5 App Tracking Transparency ATT, which was introduced on April 27th, in other words, a structure where an app gets explicit permission from the user when tracking users across other webs and applications. At the same time, the Human Interface Guidelines are also updated to prohibit monetary payments to users who have enabled tracking.

ATT is expected to be a big blow to target advertising, and Facebook, which is a major source of income, has campaigned against it in addition to full-page advertisements in newspapers. You can guess from Mark Zuckerberg’s fury how effective it will actually work.

TSMC, the world’s largest semiconductor foundry, is said to have officially started manufacturing semiconductor products using the 5-nano manufacturing process from June 2020. In the midst of this, Wei Jerja’s CEO is drawing attention by revealing the next generation 5-nano manufacturing process, the timing of mass production of the 3-nano manufacturing process, and the R&D status of the 2-nano manufacturing process.

According to this, TSMC aims to start mass production of semiconductors using N3, a 3-nano manufacturing process, in the second half of 2022. In addition, according to the 2020 annual report, the research and development of the 2-nano manufacturing process is proceeding smoothly, and TSMC is focusing on areas such as memory technology and 3D transistors, and is in the process of research and development for this purpose.

Next news. The cryptocurrency DM project developed by Facebook hasn’t moved much for a long time, but according to reports, the test is scheduled to begin at the end of this year.

DM was first announced in 2019 and was called Libra at the time. But after that, it changed its name to DM. It is said that this time the currency exchange rate will be fixed at the dollar. Facebook, one of the money lines in the IT industry, seems to be preparing to enter the cryptocurrency industry in earnest. Thank you.