On September 21 local time, the expanded Silicon Carbide (SiC) factory in Roznov, Czech Republic, was completed. The capacity will gradually increase 16 times in the next two years, and 200 new jobs will be created by the end of 2024. Up to now, the company has invested more than US $150 million in the Czech factory and will continue to invest US $300 million before the end of 2023.
As a leading manufacturer of silicon carbide, the pace of production expansion this year is radical. In July, Ansome invested US $1 billion in Fuchuan City, Gyeonggi Province, to establish a new research center and wafer manufacturing plant, and the output SiC power chips will be deployed in electric vehicles, which are expected to be put into production in 2025; In August, the silicon carbide factory in Hudson, New Hampshire, was officially completed, which will increase the SiC wafer production capacity of the company by five times year on year by the end of 2022.
In addition to Ansomy, several leading silicon carbide enterprises have disclosed the latest production expansion plan.
For example, Wolfspeed announced that it would build the world's largest silicon carbide material factory, aiming to increase the company's silicon carbide material production capacity in North Carolina by more than 10 times; Infineon's silicon carbide and gallium nitride plants in Malaysia officially laid the foundation in July this year. The total investment of the project is about 14.4 billion yuan, and the shipment will start in the second half of 2024.
The strong demand for silicon carbide for new energy vehicles, or the biggest power that big factories are constantly increasing. 90% of the demand for silicon carbide of Ansenmey is related to automobiles; In Q4 2022, 70% - 75% of Wolfspeed's design in (new product development plan) is related to cars.
Futu Securities said that with the increasing penetration of new energy vehicles and the vehicle architecture moving towards 800V high voltage, silicon carbide devices are expected to usher in large-scale development in such fields as main inverter, DC/DC conversion system, on-board charging system and charging pile.
TrendForce Jibang Consulting, a market research institution, said that from the perspective of China, the world's largest electric vehicle market, SAIC, GAC and other auto companies have started to layout the whole SiC industry chain, which has created great development opportunities for local suppliers.
It is worth noting that although the global silicon carbide business is developing in full swing from the perspective of production expansion, it will take time for large-scale profits.
The company even said that during the ramp up of production capacity before the first half of 2023, the cost of starting mass production of silicon carbide would have a negative impact on the company's gross profit margin of 1% - 2%; Wolfspeed achieved its first quarterly profit of $32 million in Q4 of fiscal year 2022.
At home, Tianyue has advanced in mastering the core link of silicon carbide, substrate, and has just signed a large order of 1.4 billion yuan, 2.8 times of last year's revenue. However, the company is still in a loss state, with revenue of 161 million yuan and loss of 73 million yuan in the first half of the year; Hubei San'an, a subsidiary of San'an Optoelectronics, which is mainly engaged in silicon carbide business, had a net profit of only 90 million yuan in the first half of the year.