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Nijmegen-based chipmaker Nexperia is at the center of a Europe-wide chip crisis, which threatens to shutter auto production across the continent. Photo: Norbert Voskens/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images A move by Chinese semiconductor producer Nexperia to suspend exports is about to hit European auto makers hard, with the Volkswagen Group admitting it only had chip supplies to last it another week. In a move that brings back the nightmares of the 2021-2023 Covid-19 semiconductor crisis to European automakers, the Nexperia move was sparked by a political dispute over tariffs, and threatens to take out an innocent bystander. The crisis was sparked by Trump Government pressure on the Dutch Government to take control of the Netherlands-based Nexperia, originally spun off by Phillips, but bought by China’s Wingtech for $3.6 billion in 2019. Senior Trump officials have been pushing The Netherlands over the company’s relatively low-tech, high-volume chip production, fearing a technology transfer from The Netherlands to the parent company in China. The European Automobile Manufacturers’ Association (ACEA) explained the crisis has left its members “increasingly concerned” and that most were expecting “imminent assembly-line stoppages”. The European makers had looked to Nexperia as their panacea for any future chip crisis from traditionally Asian suppliers, with the company manufacturing more than 100 billion chips a year. MORE FOR YOU The silicon wafers are made in Germany and Great Britain, which are shipped to China and other Asian nations to be sliced into chips, then packaged and sold, and it returned Nexperia $2 billion in sales last year. The Nexperia chips are used all over modern cars, ranging from power window switch software to seat controls and all points in between. Volkswagen Group CFO Arno Antlitz confirmed during its latest financial results presentation that the crisis was, indeed, a looming one for Europe’s biggest auto manufacture. “We look on the issue day by day and week by week, and what we can say until the end of next week, we have enough supply.” he said. It has suspended production of the high-volume Golf hatch and wagon at its flagship Wolfsburg headquarters already, and expects rolling stoppages for the Tiguan, Touran and Taryon SUVs as it eyes off alternative supply chains. “We cannot stand still,” Antlitz said. “We have responsibility. So we try to find alternative sources, get it from alternative sources. We achieved that so far. “We secure the production day by day and week by week. We are now safe until the end of next week, and the teams continue to work. For the time being, it's good news that we are safe for another week.” Antlitz pointed the finger at political relations between China and the USA as the source of the crisis, insisting there wasn’t a lot the automakers could do to resolve it. “Obviously, a lot of current trade restrictions are based on the relation between US and China. This is not a physical supply shortage; it is a supply shortage that's based on political decisions and other decisions. “It is just political; this is how it needs also to be solved. I really look forward to the parties sitting together and finding solutions for the European and basically the worldwide industry." Wingtech was put on the Trump government’s blacklist in 2024, and that rolled in Nexperia as well, and the Dutch Government thought it had earned the local arm an exemption with its September 30 intervention, blocking any tech transfer to Wingtech. Nexperia’s Chinese CEO, Wingtech founder Zhang Xuezhen, was suspended by a Dutch court for “mismanagement”, which prompted China into blocking Nexperia exports from China. Editorial StandardsReprints & Permissions
