Elpida Bankruptcy Brings Lessons to Chinese IC Industry

On February 27th, ELPIDA, the world’s third-largest memory card maker, filed a bankruptcy application with the Tokyo District Court. With a total debt of 448 billion yen (approximately 34.6 billion renminbi), this is the largest bankruptcy case in Japan this year. It is also the first bankruptcy case of a listed company. Its bankruptcy is the largest in bankruptcy in Japan in the 30th year. In addition to Elpida, and some Japanese and South Korean manufacturers with unusual scenery in the past, either went bankrupt or lost a large amount of money. We Chinese IC companies must learn from this tremendous change and learn from lessons learned so as to be able to cope with future changes. Various kinds of crisis.

The idea of ​​developing a bulk product manufacturing industry in Japan is out of date. Around 2000, SoC design concept has become very popular, which indicates that the development concept of IC has changed from manufacturing mode to design service mode. Since integrated circuits have been developed to a design stage where system modules can be assembled in accordance with "functional modules", high-cost countries like Japan and the United States have their mature integrated circuit resources accumulated, and they should properly handle DRAM technology barriers in a timely manner. Bulk products, move to lower-cost countries or regions, abandon untimely "manufacturing concepts", and instead rely on their own design resources such as IP cores, embedded products, etc., to provide users with "design services" to get the most Competitive development advantages. There are many producers of DRAM products and the competition is fierce. Elpida based in Japan to manufacture DRAM has no advantage in terms of cost. Elpida still adheres to the concept of “manufacturing and building industry”. Whether it can change in a crisis or not, the reality has long been aggravated and will inevitably become increasingly heavy.

The "head sheep" is exhausted and the "flock" is involved. Elpida, as a dedicated DRAM manufacturer, was hampered by the declining market share of Japan's electronic machine products, and has always been unable to provide ancillary services to its customers. Nowadays, Japanese electronic information companies such as Sony, Panasonic, and Toshiba, which have been thunderstorms, are now facing technological advancements and innovation capabilities. Their halo has long been taken away by companies such as Samsung, Google, Nokia, and Apple, and the industrial chain and ecological environment are increasingly deterioration. Elpida also seems to be out of luck and has always been in a difficult position to make ends meet.

Misconceptions lead to wrong choices, as can be seen from the success of the virtual IDM service model. Elpida's initial decision-making was a transition from the SoC service mode to the virtual IDM service mode. This is like the transition from “full-schedule” to “individual a la carte” mode of restaurant service. This is the rise of IC design technology after SoC. Another new stage of development. As the integrated circuit technology, products and processes become increasingly sophisticated, many ready-made “functional products” have been stored in the computer, such as IP, system-level solutions, etc., which can be produced separately, processed into IC products quickly, and can also be embedded To the user is developing products, on demand tying, and Elpida is lost to Samsung in this regard.