Giants have seized the automotive chip market, the automotive industry value chain will be reconstructed

According to market research firm Gartner, the number of vehicles using the Internet of Vehicles in the world will increase significantly from the current 60 million units to 250 million units in 2020. Another analyst, IHS, pointed out that by 2035, there will be 21 million unmanned vehicles worldwide.

A profound change is taking place in the automotive industry. The future trend of intelligence, networking and electrification is making the car look like a computer with four wheels. Digital components such as processors, computing power and internetworking are also being replaced. The core position of mechanical components such as engines and gearboxes, namely, vehicle chips and computing power providers, will be at the core of the future smart car industry.

In the past, the automotive industry has always had its own chip suppliers, including NXP, Infineon, STMicroelectronics, Renesas and other companies, they firmly occupy the automotive semiconductor market, and outsiders have little chance to enter. But with the rise of ADAS and autonomous driving technology, the demand for computing and data processing capabilities of smart cars has skyrocketed, and the processing and computing power for massive data is exactly what Intel, Qualcomm, NVIDIA and other companies are good at. These consumer product chip companies cut into the automotive chip market to provide opportunities for cornering overtaking.

The application of chips and processors in automobiles is not something that has existed in the past few years. Since the car chips involve the safety of vehicles, the architecture of these chips is quite different from that of consumer products. The market for automotive chips has always been enlightened. Pu, Freescale, Infineon, STMicroelectronics, Renesas, Bosch and other companies occupy.

Although Intel, Qualcomm, and NVIDIA have all launched their own automotive product solutions, their previous presence in the automotive chip market was not strong. This situation is changing rapidly. As cars are becoming more and more intelligent, voice recognition, gesture interaction, 4G network connection, night vision system, ADAS assisted driving system, semi-automatic driving, automatic driving and other functions are constantly emerging, and will gradually become standard, and the first batch Automated driving vehicles are also expected to officially start on the road around 2020, and the demand for computing power will increase exponentially.

Intel CEO Ke Zaiqi said at IDF 2016 that a self-driving car will generate 4000GB of data every day. The processing power of massive data is lacking in traditional automotive chip manufacturers. But these are areas that companies like Intel, Qualcomm, and Nvidia are good at, which provides an excellent opportunity for them to enter the automotive chip market.

In particular, Qualcomm and Nvidia, their interest in the automotive industry can even be described as obsessive. At the 2015, 2016 CES or NVIDIA GTC conferences, people have seen that NVIDIA's introduction of its graphics products is very brief, and deep learning and autopilot related products have become the focus of their introduction.

Qualcomm is also not satisfied with just launching an Snapdragon 820A and 602A in-vehicle computing platform that provides computing power for the in-vehicle central control system. It directly invested $47 billion in cash to acquire automotive semiconductor manufacturer NXP, which has just completed the The acquisition of Freescale, a automotive semiconductor manufacturer, has become the world's largest automotive semiconductor company.

If the previous automotive semiconductor market belongs to the cakes of Freescale, STMicroelectronics and Renesas, then Qualcomm, NVIDIA, Intel and other companies as the outsiders who grab cakes will promote profound changes in the market structure of automotive semiconductors. .

According to IHS data, the overall size of the global automotive semiconductor market in 2015 was approximately $29 billion. In terms of output value alone, the market size of automotive semiconductors is not large, but in terms of growth rate, automotive semiconductors have the fastest growth rate in all semiconductor applications. The global semiconductor industry research report released by market research firm IC Insights shows that from 2013 to 2018, the output value of automotive semiconductors will grow at a rate of 10.8% per year. Qualcomm's acquisition of NXP's big deal is NXP's dominance in the automotive semiconductor field and the growth potential of the automotive semiconductor industry.

Although the growth potential is huge, it is not easy for companies such as NVIDIA, Qualcomm, and Intel to replicate their glory in the consumer electronics arena.

First of all, car manufacturers are not willing to be restrained. The automotive industry has a history of more than 100 years, and many companies are large companies with tens of billions of assets. They have also seen the future development of the automotive industry, and are actively conducting research on autonomous driving. In their development process, they often use their own design calculation modules to provide computing power for their vehicles, and they are not eager to purchase a similar overall solution for NVIDIA Drive PX.

Second, automotive chip manufacturers are also launching their own solutions. For example, Bosch has established the Driver Service Driving Division in 2012. In addition to providing a full range of ADAS solutions for a number of companies, Bosch has also developed unmanned vehicles with Changan and conducted 2,000 kilometers in China. Road test.

Finally, it faces competition from the overall solution of technology companies. In addition to computing modules such as CPU and GPU, autopilot technology requires artificial intelligence, algorithms and other software systems. These are not the areas that hardware vendors are good at. Technology companies such as Google, Baidu, Didi, Uber, etc. have also entered the industry, and are ready to launch a total solution that integrates software and hardware systems. For manufacturers with weaker R&D capabilities, it is undoubtedly more attractive to directly purchase a total solution like Google.

After entering the 21st century, the automotive industry is increasingly being changed by information technology. From the very beginning to improve the design, production, manufacturing and other processes of automobiles, and now to change the car itself, the automotive industry is undergoing a profound revolution. Driven by this industrial revolution, the value chain of the automobile industry will also be reconstructed. Chip companies such as intelligent software systems and processors will be at the top of the industrial chain, gaining most of the profits, and the status of vehicle manufacturing and component manufacturing enterprises. Will gradually decline.