Earthquake prompts Renesas to suspend output at Japan semiconductor plants

[22OBX]

Hits keep coming…where does Ford source chips? Hopefully no major damage and few days at most.

TOKYO – Renesas Electronics Corp., a key maker of semiconductors for the global automotive industry, has suspended operations at three plants in Japan after a major earthquake hit the country’s northeast, triggering a tsunami, causing blackouts and snarling transportation.
Renesas said all three plants, its Naka, Takasaki and Yonezawa factories, are near the quake zone, which was centered off the Pacific coast from the city of Sendai. The 7.4-magnitude temblor rattled cities as far away as Tokyo when it struck shortly after 11:30 p.m. on Wednesday.

Any long-term interruption at Renesas output could broadside a global automotive industry already reeling from a worldwide semiconductor shortage that has hammered production and sales. All three of the affected plants produce chips used in the automotive sector.

In the latest natural disaster, Renesas said Thursday that electricity has been restored to the two plants that lost power overnight. The company is currently assessing the impact on equipment and products, as well as the safety of the facilities and the condition of clean rooms.

Renesas said it could not say when production might resume at the Naka and Takasaki factories. The company said it had partially resumed production of some test lines at its Yonezawa plant.
The Naka and Yonezawa plants make microcontrollers for automotive and industrial use. The Takasaki plant makes so-called PMOS chips used in converting AC-DC electrical currents.
The plants shut down automatically when power was disrupted overnight. Even if there is no damage, it will take several days to completely restart the facilities, a Renesas spokesman said.

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[22OBX]

Hits keep coming…where does Ford source chips? Hopefully no major damage and few days at most.

TOKYO – Renesas Electronics Corp., a key maker of semiconductors for the global automotive industry, has suspended operations at three plants in Japan after a major earthquake hit the country’s northeast, triggering a tsunami, causing blackouts and snarling transportation.
Renesas said all three plants, its Naka, Takasaki and Yonezawa factories, are near the quake zone, which was centered off the Pacific coast from the city of Sendai. The 7.4-magnitude temblor rattled cities as far away as Tokyo when it struck shortly after 11:30 p.m. on Wednesday.

Any long-term interruption at Renesas output could broadside a global automotive industry already reeling from a worldwide semiconductor shortage that has hammered production and sales. All three of the affected plants produce chips used in the automotive sector.

In the latest natural disaster, Renesas said Thursday that electricity has been restored to the two plants that lost power overnight. The company is currently assessing the impact on equipment and products, as well as the safety of the facilities and the condition of clean rooms.

Renesas said it could not say when production might resume at the Naka and Takasaki factories. The company said it had partially resumed production of some test lines at its Yonezawa plant.
The Naka and Yonezawa plants make microcontrollers for automotive and industrial use. The Takasaki plant makes so-called PMOS chips used in converting AC-DC electrical currents.
The plants shut down automatically when power was disrupted overnight. Even if there is no damage, it will take several days to completely restart the facilities, a Renesas spokesman said.

Better news this morning, 3/18/22. Hopefully no impact to us waiting.

Critical semiconductor maker Renesas Electronics Corp. said it had resumed partial test-run production at two of three plants near the quake zone. Those plants, its Naka and Takasaki factories, should reach full pre-earthquake production capacity on March 23.

The third Renesas plant that was affected, its Yonezawa factory, restarted all production processes on March 18 and expects to return to normal operational levels on March 20.
All three plants, which make chips for the automotive sector, were automatically shut down when the quake struck. Any long-term interruption at Renesas could have broadsided a global automotive industry already reeling from the worldwide semiconductor shortage.
Renesas emerged as a weak link in the 2011 earthquake, when its Naka plant was thrown offline for months.