Episode 16: Is the Semiconductor Growth Cycle Over?
Ben Bajarin and Jay Goldberg discuss the current state of the semiconductor industry, arguing that while secular growth continues, the recent hyper-growth cycle has ended due to saturation in smartphones and PCs. They analyze how industry consolidation, particularly by Broadcom, has created pricing power for a few key players like Nvidia and TSMC, while smaller vendors struggle with supply access and commoditization. The hosts also explore the constraints of leading-edge capacity, the potential for chiplet architectures to utilize older nodes like 7nm, and the rising influence of Chinese foundry SMIC.