Lost my chips

[Bryson]

Now, I don't usually browse stockmarket type news, but this is somewhat concerning:

 

https://kalkinemedia.com/au/stocks/technology/how-is-global-chip-shortage-to-impact-ad8s-business

 

The long and the short of it is that Audinate are having a hard time getting parts for their Brooklyn II assemblies, which are used by..pretty much everyone using Dante. Looks like Dante products are about to be in even shorter supply than they are now, and possibly will become unavailable for a while until they can either source a different part supplier or release Brooklyn III in Q4 2022.

 

Thoughts?

[J Pearce]

This is in part why AVNU Milan is gaining traction. Being more open than Dante manufacturers aren’t tied solely to one developer’s integration chip.

[chelgrian]

This is in part why AVNU Milan is gaining traction. Being more open than Dante manufacturers aren’t tied solely to one developer’s integration chip.

 

While it might succeed for point to point it appears to have the same issue that AVB does that it relies upon TSN extensions for Ethernet for switched networks.

 

The cost of switches which support the required standards tend to be prohibitive and they tend to have limitations on how they can be used and maintain conformance. Where as Dante tends to run on almost any gigabit switch that supports diffserv. This is why Dante took off in a much bigger way than AVB.

 

 

Thoughts?

 

So the translation looks like. They were using Samsung to fab a custom chip and they failed to book production far enough in advance.

 

They then must have made the decision that instead of ordering more of their current generation which currently might take 25 weeks or more just to come back from the fab and weeks more to package and test that they would wait for their next generation instead so they didn't have inventory of a product that had just been or was just about to be superseded which would then be difficult to shift. If they were going to launch that new generation in Q4 22 anyway then it would have gone to the fab in Q1 22 under current conditions.

 

While awkward for everyone downstream who didn't have enough of their own inventory it sadly make sense from a business point of view for audinate as the least worst option.

[Big Dave]

To be fair to Audinate, the chip in question isn't unique to them. Its a very widely used device across many industries.

 

The manufacturer of said chip, which was on Long lead times anyway, announced last week with no prior warning there would be no more supply for a significant period, if ever.

[kgallen]

To be fair to Audinate, the chip in question isn't unique to them. Its a very widely used device across many industries.

 

The manufacturer of said chip, which was on Long lead times anyway, announced last week with no prior warning there would be no more supply for a significant period, if ever.

 

From what I can glean from here: https://www.afr.com/...20211024-p592nm and here: https://www.audinate...or-xilinx-fpgas it's a Xilinx FPGA. In which case it will be a standard order part, not a custom chip. The integrating customer (Audinate in this case) will do the programming with the logic they require. If Xilinx have chosen to discontinue it then maybe it is one of their older parts or maybe other customers are getting priority on any shipments. The IP Core page suggests it's a part from the Spartan 6 family which have been around since 2015. There seem to be Xilinx forum Spartan 6 end-of-life discussions from 2020 so maybe Audinate are caught a bit short with Spartan6 supply issues at EOL and not having their Brooklyn III design ready yet...

Edited November 1, 2021 by kgallen