Network Gear To Be In Short Supply For 60 Weeks +
Network gear providers such as Netgear and D Link are facing major shortages of components for internet routers and switches with some providers of network of parts forecasting delays of 60 weeks.
According to Bloomberg carriers have been quoted order times as long as 60 weeks, more than doubling previous wait times, the lack of components could also delay Australia’s roll out of 5G networks while also preventing Companies from expanding their networks to cope with work at home employees.
Graeme Reardon the CEO of D Link in Australia said that he has already had to forecast out sales “Until March of 2022”.
Running out of the right router would prevent a carrier from being able to add new subscribers to its network, risking lost sales in the ever-competitive broadband market analysts predict.
Their supply chains have become a headache because sharp coronavirus manufacturing shutdowns a year ago were exacerbated by a prolonged surge in demand for better home broadband equipment.
Zyxel Corp, a Taiwan-based router-maker who supplies equipment to several network brands selling into the Australian market have asked customers to order products a year in advance, because the lead time for components like chips from suppliers such as Broadcom has doubled to a year or more.
Analysts claim that supply of networking gear “looks strained for the next six months”.
Broadcom did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Some 90% of its 2021 supply has already been ordered, CEO Hock Tan said last month.
According to observers since Chinese factories restarted, chipsets have become a global bottleneck, choked by shortages of parts like silicon wafers as well as supply-demand mismatches. Components for other systems like memory and power management are also affected they claim.
“It’s a snowball effect that we’re pushing in front of us, and the situation since then has just become worse and worse and worse,” said one industry executive. “When I talk to some of the chipset vendors, some of them tell me that they have something like overbooking of 300% of their capacity.”
With semiconductor foundries struggling to allocate scarce capacity, less profitable work gets pushed to the back of the line.