Japan, South Korea, China main land and Taiwan are the main regions for the production of aluminum electrolytic capacitors, and Japanese companies have always been dominant in the aluminum electrolytic capacitor market. From the sales of aluminum electrolytic capacitors in recent years, the top four are Japanese companies. In total, they account for 56%, more than half of the share.

Japanese companies are gradually withdrawing from the low-end market. On the other hand, due to the demand for aluminum electrolytic capacitors driven by automotive electronics and servers, Japanese manufacturers are focusing on higher value-added automotive, medical, military, and industrial fields. Demands in consumer electronic capacitors and material markets has gradually shifted to non-Japanese manufacturers- the mainland of China and Taiwan.

In 2018, the shortage of aluminum foil material caused nagative components such as aluminum capacitors to rise again. Affected by changes in sales strategies of Japanese capacitor manufacturers and supply shortage of aluminum foil materials in China, Japanese capacitor manufacturers have extended their delivery schedules from the original 6 weeks to 12 weeks, and some have even reached the half-year delivery schedule.

On the one hand, Japanese capacitor lead time have been extended, and downstream customers are expected to increase orders from non-Japanese capacitor manufacturers and to pull orders from capacitor suppliers in mainland China and Taiwan.

On the other hand, Japanese and Taiwan capacitor manufacturers have already increased their prices, and mainland capacitor manufacturers are expected to benefit from the global price increase. Upstream electronic aluminum foils and electrode foils are also expected to increase in price in the shortage of goods.

In summary, due to the influence of downstream demand and upstream shortage of raw materials, the price of aluminum electrolytic capacitors is expected to be strongly rised in 2018, and due to the expansion of product quality and environmental protection, the supply of raw materials is expected to be tight in the next two years.