Advertisment

World chip market : strong growth ahead

author-image
CIOL Bureau
New Update

The semiconductor market will post worldwide sales growth of 15 per cent this year as gross revenue will top $144 billion, according to the Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) which held its annual forecast meeting in Santa Clara this week. For 2000, the SIA is projecting a strong 21 per cent growth year with sales reaching $174 billion.



This is the first year since 1995 that the chip industry has achieved double-digit growth. A year ago, the SIA forecasted a 9 per cent growth rate to $133 billion. But the recovery in Asian economies, strong US PC demand and the recent increase in memory chip prices have added $11 billion in revenues for the industry this year. The chip market will continue to grow in 2001 and 2002 when the SIA forecasts sales of $209 billion (20 per cent growth) and $234 billion (12 per cent growth), respectively.



The IC market growth will also spell recovery for the chip equipment industry whose fortunes ­ and misfortunes ­ are closely tied to developments in the chip market. Sales will jump 63 per cent to $4.1 billion this year, 36 per cent in 2000 to $5.5 billion, 19 per cent in 2001 to $6.6 billion.



That is good news for Advanced Micro Devices and Intel, two of the leading suppliers of flash memories. The microprocessor market, which managed to grow robustly all through the past four years of recession, is losing some of its momentum. Rising competition and a maturing PC market are preventing microprocessor sales from achieving significant sales increases. Microprocessors will grow 11 per cent to $28 billion in 1999, 17 per cent to $32 billion in 2000, 14 per cent to $40 billion in 2001 and 13 per cent in 2002 to $42 billion.

tech-news