[경제]”It’s not enough, though…” Semiconductor factory stopped by natural disaster

[앵커]

Due to natural disasters such as a cold wave that hit the United States, global semiconductor plants including Samsung Electronics’ Austin plant have been shut down one after another.

Due to the nature of semiconductors, once stopped, the damage is inevitable.

The supply of semiconductors for vehicles, which has already suffered from a shortage of supplies, is expected to be disrupted.

This is reporter Lee Ji-eun.

[기자]

Texas, USA frozen by a winter storm.

As power generation facilities were shut down and power supply was cut off, long lines of people lined up to buy propane gas for heating.

Due to power shortages, the Samsung Electronics semiconductor plant in Austin also stopped for the first time since production started in 1998.

In 2018, a 30-minute power outage in the Pyeongtaek business site resulted in a loss of KRW 50 billion.

[이종호 / 서울대 반도체공동연구소장 : (반도체 공장) 전원이 다시 복귀가 돼서 전원을 다시 켤 수 있다고 해도 장비를 금방 원래 양산 조건으로 돌릴 수 없기 때문에 상당한 시간이나 피해가 예상됩니다.]

In addition, the shutdown of NXP, the world’s number one automotive semiconductor company in Texas, and the second-largest Infineon plant in Texas, took a super emergency for the automotive semiconductor industry, which was suffering from global supply and demand due to Corona 19.

In addition, Japan’s Renesas, the third largest in the world, has also been disrupted in operation after the Fukushima earthquake on the 13th.

Korea is a semiconductor powerhouse, but automobile semiconductors depend entirely on imports.

The Hyundai Motor Group said it is importing automotive semiconductors from Europe, where there is no downtime, but it is watching the situation seriously.

[이항구 / 한국자동차연구원 연구위원 : (반도체 업체들이) 신규 투자와 증설 투자에 들어가고 있지만, 이것이 결과적으로는 길게는 1년 정도 소요될 것이기 때문에 올해 가을까지는 차량용 반도체 공급의 차질이 지속될 것으로 예상을 합니다.]

With a forecast that the world’s production of 1 million cars will be delayed in the first quarter alone due to a disruption in semiconductor supply, a series of natural disasters is putting a dark cloud on the automotive industry.

YTN Lee Ji-eun[[email protected]]is.

[저작권자(c) YTN & YTN plus 무단전재 및 재배포 금지]