Wafers here, packages there
Car Chips Are Made in Europe, the US and Japan, and Finished in Asia
Automotive chips are made on wafers in Europe, the US, Japan and Taiwan, then most of them cross a border to be packaged and tested in China or Southeast Asia. That back-end step, not the leading-edge wafer, is where the industry was cut in October 2025. Nexperia, a Dutch maker of the discretes, small logic and power transistors found in every module of a car, made its wafers in Hamburg and Greater Manchester and packaged about 70% of its European output at its plant in Dongguan, China.
When China stopped exports from Dongguan, Honda and Volkswagen slowed or stopped lines within weeks, over parts that cost a few cents each. A car with a missing diode on a brake controller cannot ship. Leading-edge chips get the policy attention; the automotive supply chain breaks on the cheap parts with the longest qualification times, and on where they are finished.
Nexperia split
One Supplier Became Two Companies in a Year
| When | What happened | Effect on supply |
|---|---|---|
| September 30, 2025 | The Dutch Ministry of Economic Affairs takes control of Nexperia's governance under the Goods Availability Act, citing the risk that technology and equipment would move out of Europe | None yet |
| October 2025 | China blocks exports of Nexperia's finished products from its Guangdong plant; a Dutch court moves Wingtech's shares to a trustee and suspends founder Zhang Xuezheng as CEO | Shortages of transistors, diodes and logic chips; Honda suspends some plants in China and Japan, Volkswagen slows lines |
| Late October 2025 | Nexperia stops shipping wafers from Europe to its Chinese unit | Dongguan runs on wafer inventory |
| November 19, 2025 | The Dutch government suspends its order after talks with China, Germany, the EU and the US; China allows shipments to resume | Partial recovery, supply described as drip-fed |
| December 2025 | The Chinese unit, now run as an independent company, secures its 2026 IGBT wafers from local fabs: Wingtech's Wingsky Semi (12-inch, Shanghai), Shanghai GAT and United Nova Technology | China supply decoupled from Hamburg |
| 2026 | A Dutch court orders an inquiry into mismanagement (February); Wingtech sues Nexperia for $1.2B (May); a Chinese court freezes Chinese Nexperia assets (August). Nexperia Europe reports $300.3M first-quarter revenue and a profit, and builds back-end capacity outside China | Two supply chains under one name |
Market
A $74 Billion Market Led by Infineon
| Measure | Value | Source |
|---|---|---|
| World automotive semiconductor market | $74.4B, up from $69.9B in 2024 | TechInsights, April 2026 |
| Largest supplier | Infineon, 12.8% share, first for the sixth year | TechInsights via Infineon |
| Automotive microcontrollers | Infineon 36.0% share, up 3.9 points | TechInsights via Infineon |
| Other leading suppliers | NXP, STMicroelectronics, Texas Instruments, Renesas, Bosch, onsemi | Company reports |
| Light vehicles sold, 2025 | About 90 million (forecast) | S&P Global Mobility |
| Chips per vehicle, average | About $830 (computed: market divided by vehicles) | SemiconductorX |
Per vehicle
About $830 of Chips Per Car, Spread Very Unevenly
Dividing the 2025 market by about 90 million light vehicles gives roughly $830 of semiconductors per vehicle on average (computed). The average hides a wide spread. A basic gasoline car carries a few hundred dollars of chips, mostly microcontrollers, analog and discretes. A battery electric vehicle adds a silicon carbide or IGBT traction inverter, an on-board charger and a battery management system, each heavy in power semiconductors. A car with a hands-off driver assistance computer adds a leading-edge SoC, its memory and a ring of cameras and radar.
The count of devices tells a different story from the value. Even the most advanced cars carry only a handful of leading-edge chips; the thousands of other devices are mature-node parts. See Tesla: A Rolling Data Center for one vehicle counted chip by chip, and Mature-Node MCUs for why a cheap microcontroller can stop a line.
Where made
Most Automotive Chips Cross a Border Before They Reach a Car
Chip domains
Only Driver Assistance and Cockpit Use Leading-Edge Silicon
| Domain | Main chips | Leading suppliers | Process class |
|---|---|---|---|
| Driver assistance and autonomy | SoCs, DRAM, cameras, radar transceivers, lidar | NVIDIA, Mobileye, Qualcomm, Tesla, Horizon Robotics; Sony, onsemi, OmniVision; NXP, TI, Infineon radar | Leading edge (TSMC 7nm to 4nm, Samsung 7nm) plus mature RF and sensor nodes |
| Electric drivetrain | SiC MOSFETs or IGBTs, gate drivers, current sensors, motor-control MCUs | Infineon, ST, onsemi, Wolfspeed, Rohm, BYD Semiconductor | SiC 150mm and 200mm; silicon power |
| Battery | Cell monitoring ICs, battery management MCUs, isolators | ADI, TI, NXP, Infineon, Renesas | Analog and mixed-signal, 65nm to 180nm |
| Body and comfort | MCUs, motor drivers, smart switches, LED drivers, CAN and LIN transceivers | NXP, Infineon, ST, Renesas, Microchip, Nexperia, onsemi | Mature, 40nm to 180nm |
| Cockpit and connectivity | Infotainment SoCs, memory, modems, Wi-Fi, Ethernet PHYs | Qualcomm, NXP, MediaTek, AMD, Marvell | Leading edge for SoCs; mature for networking |
| Safety systems | Airbag and braking MCUs, inertial sensors, power management | Bosch, Infineon, NXP, ST, Murata | Mature, with automotive grade qualification |
China
China Is Building Its Own Automotive Chain
China is the largest car market and the largest automotive chip market, and it wants more of its chips made at home. In 2024 Beijing reportedly asked automakers to source 25% of their chips locally by 2025. BYD makes its own IGBTs and SiC devices through BYD Semiconductor; Horizon Robotics supplies driver-assistance SoCs made at TSMC; and the Chinese half of Nexperia now buys wafers from Chinese fabs instead of Hamburg. Western suppliers still lead in China: Infineon ranked first in the Chinese automotive chip market in 2025 (TechInsights).
The result is two automotive chip chains that share customers. Western carmakers building in China buy Chinese-made parts for local models; their home plants still need the European, US and Japanese parts and the Asian back end. See China Bifurcation.
US status
US Fabs Make Analog and Some MCUs, Not the Discretes
- Made in US
- Some US volume
- US planned
- Made abroad
| Chip group | Example US sites | Notes | US status |
|---|---|---|---|
| Microcontrollers | NXP Austin, Texas; Microchip Gresham, Oregon | Newest automotive MCUs (28nm and below) are made at TSMC in Taiwan | Some US volume |
| Analog and power management | Texas Instruments Sherman and Richardson, Texas; Lehi, Utah | Packaged mostly in Malaysia and the Philippines | Made in US |
| SiC power | Wolfspeed Mohawk Valley, New York (200mm devices); onsemi Hudson, New Hampshire (SiC crystal) | Most SiC modules assembled in Asia and Europe | Some US volume |
| Discretes and small logic | None at volume | Nexperia, Rohm, Diodes and Vishay make most in Europe and Asia | Made abroad |
| Image sensors | onsemi Nampa, Idaho | Sony makes most automotive image sensors in Japan | Some US volume |
| ADAS SoCs | None in volume | TSMC Arizona makes some leading-edge logic, not yet automotive SoCs | Made abroad |
Record
Page Record
- Covers
- Automotive semiconductor supply locations, the Nexperia split, automotive chip market and leading suppliers, chips per vehicle, chips by vehicle domain, China's automotive chip chain and US production status
- Sources
- TechInsights automotive semiconductor vendor ranking via Infineon (April 14, 2026); Reuters on Nexperia China wafer sourcing (December 19, 2025); CBT News on the Wingtech appeal (December 1, 2025); Bits&Chips on Nexperia first-quarter 2026 results (June 16, 2026); Nexperia company history (Dutch control, export block, suspension, 2026 court actions); S&P Global Mobility 2025 light vehicle sales forecast; TrendForce on China's 25% local automotive chip target (May 2024, reported); company site lists for production locations; per-vehicle figure computed by SemiconductorX
- Last verified
- October 2026