The global core shortage problem is unresolved, and the production capacity of fabs is in short supply, which also drives the demand for back-end packaging and testing. However, the tight supply of fabs extends to the packaging and testing industry, which may limit the performance growth of related companies.

According to Taiwan Media Economic Daily, Zhang Qiansheng, chairman of ASE Investment Holdings, pointed out that the packaging and testing business recovered before the fourth quarter of last year, and the current capacity is fully loaded, especially the strong demand for wire packaging and packaging. The capacity gap is expected to continue throughout this year. In addition, system-in-package (SiP) sales and new project performance are strong, reaching 3.5 billion US dollars last year, an annual increase of 50%. It is expected that the growth momentum of SiP will remain for a whole year this year.

ASE COO Wu Tianyu said that the overall price environment is friendly, but it is still necessary to observe the rising trend of raw materials and key parts prices.

Li Jingong, chairman of the wafer test plant KYEC, pointed out that the production capacity of the packaging and testing industry is tight, and the results will not be known until the fourth quarter. Lu Zhiyuan, chairman of Xinquan, said that the semiconductor market can still maintain its growth tone this year, but there may be concerns about chain disconnection under the influence of the new crown epidemic and variables of insufficient industrial chain capacity. This year the semiconductor industry has new opportunities and new challenges.

Licheng CEO Xie Yongda said that the demand for wire-bonding packaging and bumping is strong. Licheng has transferred hundreds of wire-bonding machines originally used in memory to support logic chip packaging, and has fully expanded its production capacity. In addition, the acquired Chaofeng electronics production capacity continues to be short, and the tight capacity supply may continue until the end of this year.

Foreign investors in the U.S. department said that wafer supply is tight and wafer incoming materials are limited, which may limit the growth of revenue and profitability of later packaging and testing plants.

Nanmao Chairman Zheng Shijie pointed out that continuing to pay attention to the supply of wafers, medium and large-size panels benefited from the increase in customer orders, and the utilization rate of tape-and-reel chip-on-film (COF) used in driver ICs has increased; small-size panels have been added. The test is in place and has been put into production to maintain the high-end utilization level.

Regarding IC substrates, Zheng Kaian, senior analyst at the Institute of Industrial Intelligence (MIC) of the Taiwan Association for Information Technology, said that the three major ABF substrate suppliers on the island, including Xinxing, Nandian and Jingsus, continue to expand production, but the production capacity The growth rate could not meet the demand, and the ABF delivery period continued to lengthen, reaching 40 to 50 weeks.

The delivery date and price of the originally tight supply of packaging raw materials have increased simultaneously, which will inevitably affect the production capacity of packaging and testing. IC design houses can only ensure production capacity by increasing prices or signing long-term contracts.