Sino-US semiconductor export data differs by tens of billions of dollars
January 07 09:18:48, 2021
The integrated circuit industry has recently become an inevitable topic in Sino-US trade friction. According to the US Department of Commerce, China imports about $10 billion in electronic semiconductor components per year from 2015 to 2017. But from the actual situation in China, the data is much higher than this. If not counting Broadcom, Intel, Qualcomm, Micron, Texas Instruments, and Western Digital’s sales in China were US$14.796 billion, US$14.579 billion, US$10.388 billion, and US$6.6 billion, respectively, according to data from various semiconductor companies in fiscal year 2017. And $7.528 billion. Only the above five companies have exported more than US$50 billion to China. Discrimination of Export Data How many integrated circuits (or semiconductors) does the United States export to China each year? For this question, industry experts gave their opinions to the reporter. "China buys more than 100 billion US dollars of semiconductors from the United States every year, more than the sum of aircraft and soybeans. It is the largest commodity. China is the largest national market for semiconductor imports, and the United States is the largest semiconductor supplier. This data is wrong," said Gu Wenjun, chief analyst of Xinmou Research. According to research and analysis, China’s imports of integrated circuits from the United States amount to more than $120 billion. But why do the statistics between China and the United States differ so much? Wei Shaojun, director of the Department of Microelectronics and Nanoelectronics at Tsinghua University, said in an interview with the First Financial Journal that this is mainly due to the different definitions of origin between the two parties. He explained that this has been controversial in the field of semiconductors. "The United States has always insisted on the origin of the package. If it is packaged in Malaysia (re-imported to China), it will be exported to China, not to the United States." It is considered that this statistical model is very unreasonable because in the chip industry chain, packaging accounts for only a small portion of the value. "As early as ten years ago, we debated this issue at the World Semiconductor Council meeting. At that time, five members of China, the European Union, Japan, South Korea, including Chinese Taipei agreed that we should look at the highest added value in chip production. Where is the piece, where is the origin? Only the United States opposes, the United States thinks that the package is where it is, so the US statistics are unreasonable.†Wei Shaojun believes that another reasonable way is to look at the chip. The company, "If you look at the brand, the US brands of semiconductors imported by China must be the most." In terms of statistical methods and channels, there are other differences. Gu Wenjun said, “Some American companies are producing and manufacturing in Taiwan, China, and then exporting them to mainland China. They think they are exporting to Taiwan, even if the final chip enters the mainland market.†According to the company's place of purchase, "In fact, many companies have their purchasing headquarters in Singapore, and they think that they are exporting to Singapore. In fact, the chip is finally in mainland China." In addition, some of them have been counted as agents. It is difficult to count, but we estimate that there are basically about 120 billion US dollars of integrated circuits exported from the United States to China every year. The possibility of more than 120 billion or even more than 150 billion US dollars is very high." Wei Shaojun pointed out that China and the United States should be on this issue. Forming a unified standard, "I can't talk nonsense, I think it's a bit nonsense now. Who is the biggest beneficiary? It must be the brand owner." Semiconductors have zero tariffs in the face of the ongoing Sino-US trade situation, not only Only Chinese companies, including the United States, Apple, Qualcomm, Intel, etc. Feel the pressure. The relevant person in charge of Intel told the First Financial reporter: "We still don't know which products will be affected, but we believe that tariffs are usually a problem for US companies with global supply chains. We hope that the US government will provide comments. When we have more information, we will assess the potential impact.†Qualcomm President Christiano Amon told reporters that Qualcomm’s chip business in FY2017 came from Chinese OEMs’ product revenues from Apple. At twice the revenue, Qualcomm’s revenue from Chinese OEMs has grown at a compound annual growth rate of 17%. In 2015, this figure was $4 billion, compared to $6 billion last year, and Qualcomm expects to reach 80 in 2019. One hundred million U.S. dollars. Wei Shaojun said that if the Sino-US trade friction is really in the semiconductor field, the loss of the United States should be greater than that of China. "If this happens, I think the US semiconductor industry itself should be firmly opposed to this matter. They may More anxious than we are to oppose this matter." In his view, because this time is to raise tariffs, the United States exports the most semiconductors to China, and China has few integrated circuits exported to the United States. Moreover, if China exports to the US integrated circuit, it must be a factory set up by a US company in China, or it can be processed in China and returned to the United States. This practice must be harmful to American companies. "On the integrated circuit, China is not a big exporter." Wei Shaojun pointed out. Gu Wenjun believes that semiconductors have zero tariffs, and the United States will not make a fuss in semiconductors. "Of course, if China is to buy more products from the United States, it is possible to increase the import value, but it is difficult to increase it too much. On the one hand, the production capacity is limited. On the other hand, the United States involves some high-end or military-related chips that are not sold to China."