On September 21, 2022, the silicon carbide (SiC) factory expanded by automotive semiconductor giant ON Semiconductor in the Czech Republic was officially completed. The SiC production capacity of the base will be increased by 16 times in the next two years.
In addition to ON Semiconductor, major manufacturers are also accelerating their investment in SiC.
Wolfspeed recently announced that it will invest about $1.3 billion to build a new silicon carbide substrate plant in North Carolina. The new factory mainly produces 8-inch silicon carbide substrates and will increase Wolfspeed's existing silicon carbide production capacity by more than 10 times.
Hitachi Power Semiconductor plans to invest more than 100 billion yen in power semiconductors for products such as electric vehicles and electrical appliances, and is expected to triple its production capacity.
In addition, Infineon's silicon carbide and gallium nitride plant in Malaysia officially laid the foundation stone in July this year. The total investment of the project is about 14.4 billion yuan, and shipments will begin in the second half of 2024.
According to the analysis, new energy vehicles are the main application scenarios of SiC power devices. At present, the rapid development of new energy vehicles around the world has driven the continuous increase in the market demand for automotive SiC.
TrendForce pointed out that as more and more car companies begin to introduce SiC (silicon carbide) technology into electric drive systems, the market size of SiC power components for vehicles is expected to reach US$1.07 billion (about 7.19 billion yuan) in 2022, and by 2026 It will climb to US$3.94 billion (about 26.477 billion yuan) in 2018.
China's leading silicon carbide material technology ZJDN Electronic Materials Technology Corporation will add a new SiC substrate project with an annual output of 500,000 pieces.