On Nov. 1, no GM plants will be closed due to chip shortage

DETROIT (AP) — For the first time in eight months, the global shortage of computer chips won’t force General Motors to close any North American factories.

The company said Friday that starting Nov. 1, all plants that had been closed on and off since February because of the shortage will be cranking out vehicles.

The nation's largest automaker and the rest of the global auto industry have been sporadically shutting down plants since late last year due to the semiconductor shortage, which has cut supplies on dealer lots and driven new vehicle prices to record levels.

To be sure, production still isn't back to normal because some of the factories will only run on one shift per day.

Phil Amsrud, senior principal analyst for IHS Markit who studies the chip market, said GM's move is a good sign, but doesn't signal the end of the chip shortage. “It's just not a sign that the patient is through all the rough spots and it's a matter of weeks before they're released from the hospital,” he said.

GM’s plants being open may be more of a sign that the company is getting better at dealing with shortages by getting rid of some optional features and diverting those chips to other uses, he said.

Chip supply shortages are easing a bit, he said, but there are still logjams with Asian “back end” companies that cut large silicon wafers into individual chips and test and package them for distribution.

Even as automakers get more wafers from big chip makers, the back end companies have limited capacity to deal with an overwhelming demand from personal electronics and other industries, Amsrud said.

Back end companies in Malaysia and elsewhere in Asia had been having trouble keeping factories open due to employees getting sick with the novel coronavirus, but that has eased a bit in some...