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El Segundo, Calif. − Only eight out of the Top 25 semiconductor suppliers increased their revenue growth in 2012. Those include Samsung (No. 2), Qualcomm (No. 3), Broadcom (No. 9), Sony (No. 11), NXP (No. 14), nVidia (No. 15), MediaTek (No. 18) and LSI (No.24). Global IC revenue declined by 2.2 percent from 2011, according to final results from the IHS iSuppli Competitive Landscaping Tool (CLT).
"The last three months were the only quarter in 2012 that generated a year-over-year increase in semiconductor market revenue, but that growth was too little and too late to salvage a terrible year for chipmakers," said Dale Ford, senior director at IHS, in a statement. "Even so, the stronger performance in the fourth quarter represents a positive signal for the semiconductor market, marking the beginning of a new growth cycle in the industry that will be sustained though 2013. IHS predicts global semiconductor revenue will rise by 5.6 percent in 2013, bringing an end to the slump of 2012."
Several chip makers experienced double-digit revenue declines, according to the report. These include Texas Instruments (No. 4), Toshiba (No. 5), Renesas (No. 6), STMicroelectronics (No. 8), Advanced Micro Devices (No. 12), Freescale (No. 16), Elpida (No. 17), Panasonic (No. 21) and ON Semiconductor (No. 21).
The bright spots for semiconductor growth included CMOS image sensors, logic ASICs, LEDs, display drivers and sensors. CMOS image sensors experienced 38.8 percent growth thanks to new features in the wireless market, followed by logic ASICs, at 19.0 percent, driven by smart phone and media tablet demand, and LEDs, at 11.9 percent, due to adoption of LCD TV backlight and general-purpose lighting, according to Ford.
Other growth component categories were display drivers, sensors and actuators, logic ASSPs and standard logic components.
