Outlook 2009: Top global/Indian semicon trends

Global Semiconductor Industry

Outlook 2009: Top global/Indian semicon trends

Here are some thoughts on how semiconductor industry globally and the India could turn out to be, in 2009

Pradeep Chakraborty

Friday, December 05, 2008

BANGALORE, INDIA: Yes, the world is clearly reeling under an economic financial crisis and that is hurting the global semiconductor industry a lot. In fact, no one is quite willing to predict how 2009 is going to turn out.

Here are some thoughts on how the semiconductor industry, globally and the India could pan out to be, in 2009.

Top trend in microprocessors/microcontrollers

Jordan Plofsky, senior vice president, Market, Altera Corp.

Let us start off with microprocessors (MPUs) and microcontrollers (MCUs). One of the most apt persons to reflect on this aspect was Jordan Plofsky, senior vice president, Market, Altera Corp., during his recent visit to India for the Altera SOPC Conference.

Undoubtedly, the major trend will be the shift to multi-core and its challenges. These challenges include:

* Parallel programming tools.
* Memory bandwidth allocation.
* O/S support.
* Verification tools.
* Power reduction and performance improvements.

Intel has indicated earlier that parallel is getting to be regular! AMD is on an identical path as well! Parallelism, is undoubtedly a key global trend.

Let's now look at some global semiconductor industry trends for 2009.

Top global semiconductor trends for 2009
According to Altera's Plofsky, some of the major trends would be:

* Consolidation.
* Power management.
* Supply chain dynamics changing – inventory reduction.
* Focus on operational costs in a slower growth environment.

Let us now turn our attention to the Indian semiconductor industry. Here are some thoughts from S. Janakiraman, former chairman, India Semiconductor Association (ISA) and President and CEO-R&D Services, MindTree.

Indian semicon industry trends for 2009

The top five trends for the Indian semiconductor industry in 2009 are quite likely to be:

* Global customers will have higher cost pressure and increase level of offshoring and outsourcing in 2009.
* India will become an even more important market for selling semiconductors as India will show higher percentage growth than other markets.
* Decided in India and originated in India products will licensed and manufactured for the global market.
* Business models for design services will start shifting from T&M and linear with people strength to risk-reward, non linear and more skin in the game.
* India will start inventing products that matter to rural and bottom of the pyramid segments.

All of these trends are in line with what's currently happening within the Indian semiconductor industry. India is traditionally strong in embedded and design services. Several MNCs, for instance, Intel and AMD, are doing product development and design out of India. Definitely, it is a sign of the times!

©CIOL Bureau

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Chakala said on 12/5/2008 4:41:51 PM:
We need more product companies in India... prepare chips that can track movements of terrorists... they should sensors that can pick up presence of arms and ammunitions

to Chakala

jakob said on 12/5/2008 1:59:17 AM:
power management will be critical always

to jakob