World’s Top Auto Chipmakers Deepen Their Embrace of China (1)

As advanced semiconductor companies in the US and allied countries pull back from China, a less glamorous sector of the chip market is turning even more to the world’s second-biggest economy.

This season’s earnings show just how important China is to the largest players in automotive chipmaking at a moment when sales are suffering due to inventory gluts and slowing adoption in the West for electric vehicles, a key driver of demand.

In the past two weeks, Kurt Sievers, chief executive officer of NXP Semiconductors NV, contrasted weakness in industrial markets in Europe and the Americas with the ...