The global electronic component shortage poses numerous challenges for a wide range of industries, from automotive to aerospace to medical devices. What will be the long-term ramifications? 
 

Circuit Shortages

Fascinating research that looked at the commuting pattern before and after a transport strike in 2014 London found that lack of route experimentation by commuters caused non-optimal routes before the strike, but a network-wide efficiency improvement after the strike. This is primarily because commuters were forced by an externality to consider their options, and some stuck to new, better routes once the change-causing event had passed.

As hardware developers, we know that scarcity of resources — memory, pins, space, cash, and so on — has always been a catalyst for creativity. We’re now in the midst of a severe electronic component shortage, from microcontrollers to capacitors, and I’ve been wondering about the long-term effect on how we do things. While obvious short-term solutions are hoarding, scavenging, and questionable supply-chain decisions, in the long-term we might see what Transport for London had seen: a forced discovery process that results in new thinking, paths, and insights together with the abandonment of “this is how we’ve always done it.”

Needing to secure components early in the design process could result in less feature-creep and better planning in a much more robust way than we may have been used to. (Fulfillment changing from three weeks to 13 months will do that!) We will forge new relationships with smaller, perhaps specialised and yet unfamiliar, manufacturers and suppliers, and we’ll strengthen existing relationships with those who continue to support us during a difficult time. We may become less price-sensitive and more consistency-sensitive — that is, prefer those who can supply us with what we need consistently, not necessarily the most cheaply at any given point. Finally, we might better evaluate, as flippant as that sounds, whether a product is worth developing in the first place.

Hardware development cycles are long and even a supply-chain disruption blip can last a long time; this is a consequence of how modern supply chains have been imagined (a recent reminder of this is an oversized container ship blocking the Suez Canal). This current component “crisis” isn’t a blip — effects could last years or maybe less if you’re an auto manufacturer — so I anticipate that the effect will be habit-forming, for the better.

Many colleagues are having a difficult time getting their existing products made, with my sincere sympathy, but it seems that coping creativity is already in play and that’s what many of us like about our work. What are your short- and long-term plans to handle all of this?

More on Circuits and the Component Shortage

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