Hardware manufacturers hit hardest by the global semiconductor (chip) shortage are said to have had less than five days of chips in their inventories during 2021…

We’ve experienced it in our office technology business, with delays in supply of new Konica Minolta print and scan technology, and new Brother Canon Epson multifunction printers.

Interestingly, even though the supply of new electric and hybrid cars has been hit hard by the semiconductor (chip) shortage, supply of electric car charge points hasn’t so much.

During the pandemic our EV charge point installation business only experienced a short period of severe delays on the Myenergi Zappi electric car charge point.

Demand for semiconductors skyrocketed during the pandemic as folks purchased more PCs, laptops, and tablets to work or school from home, and cloud giants scaled up their backend systems to cope.

Supply couldn’t keep up. The average inventory of semiconductor buyers in 2019 was 40 days. But by 2021 it’s been estimated to be less than five days in certain sectors.

Production was initially slowed at factories around the world due to work from home orders as the coronavirus pandemic took hold. Then some chip manufacturers had to temporarily shut down after being hit with natural disasters, such as fires and snowstorms.

These chip shortages, has resulted in severe delays of many new products, pushing up demand and prices for used vehicles, refurbished print and scan devices and refurbished laptops.

In our office technology and supplies company a sizeable percentage of our business model relies on a continual supply of reasonable priced fit for purpose used printers, copiers, and laptops.

Which allows us to provide cost effective office technology solutions for our customers, in-conjunction with addressing our environmental responsibilities.

Refurbishing and re-homing fit for purpose used office technology has a much lower carbon footprint and is much more environmentally friendly than manufacturing new equipment.

Manufacturing a chip is incredibly complex. It requires all kinds of materials and specialized equipment to produce silicon wafers of ultra-miniaturized electronics. This is just the microchip without everything else that goes around it to make the product work.

Experts believe the shortage will continue throughout 2022. With the likes of Canon saying. “Chip supplies are so bad that our ink cartridges will look as though they’re fakes.”

Due to the shortages, we’ve also heard Intel has allocated $20bn for two new chip factories in Ohio.

We’ve found for most people ‘fit for purpose’ refurbished office equipment in affordable monthly subscriptions with lifetime warranty, is the right solution for the organisation and the environment.

…it also solves the chip supply problem too.