In recent years we have seen how the price of electricity in Europe has skyrocketed to the point of becoming a serious problem for some families. One of the main reasons for this increase in the price of electricity was the start of the war between Ukraine and Russia and, although it continues its course, in the last half year the price of electricity returned to pre-conflict levels. .
It has returned to normal levels, at least in Europe, since in Taiwan it has skyrocketed and not precisely because of the cost of its production. How does this affect us? Well, as always, in the price of electronic components.
At the beginning of the year, manufacturers declared that, following the excess demand for NAND memories, the price would increase by up to 20% in 2024. To this increase must be added a new tariff that the government of this country will impose. has gone out of its way to increase the price of electricity, which in some companies can lead to an increase of up to 30%.
Tax on large consumers
The country’s government has announced that it is studying the possibility of applying a tax to companies that consume more electricity in the country, a rate which, in the case of TSMC, can go up to 30%.
The companies which will be affected by this tariff have been called superconsumers. All companies that have consumed more than 5,000 million kWh in the last two years fall into this category and will be applied independently per installation and not per company. As expected, the Taiwanese industry is not happy with this news, as they will reduce their profit costs as long as they do not pass this increase on to end consumers.
Taiwan’s economic minister said some companies have been working on initiatives to reduce energy consumption for years, which has allowed them to reduce their e-bills, taking TSMC as an example. However, he also claims that, despite this new tariff, the price of electricity in this country is one of the the cheapest in the worldThis should therefore not affect their competitiveness in the market, provided they do not pass it on to the end user.
To put the price of electricity in this country in context, just buy the price. In Taiwan, the price per kW/h is around 9 euro cents. In Europe, the price of kW/h varies throughout the day between a minimum of 6 euro cents and a maximum of 30 euro cents in the most expensive time slot.
The ace lithography machines which are used to make chips are not only very expensive, but also have very high power consumption, and any variation, no matter how small, in the price of electricity will result in significant price variations.
Since TSMC is a company and not an NGO, it is very likely that the increase in the price of this house will eventually be passed on to consumers. It is clear that the continued increases affecting semiconductor manufacturing do nothing other than indicate that we either buy now or wait for demand to stabilize and prices to fall. If you are looking to buy an SSD or memory, it is advisable to do so now and not wait for the next few months.
