Electronic component manufacturers (OCMs) and their OEM/EMS customers say they don’t have much visibility into their partners’ supply chains. During the coronavirus outbreak, that visibility may determine how quickly the electronics industry bounces back from a prolonged China shutdown. A survey the ECIA conducted on Feb. 7 found a majority of OCMs didn’t know how…
Annual semiconductor unit shipments, including integrated circuits and optoelectronics, sensors, and discrete (O-S-D) devices are forecast to rise 7 percent in 2020 and surpass one trillion units for the second time in history, according to IC Insights’ McClean Report. The 7 percent increase to 1,036.3 billion total semiconductor shipments expected in 2020 follows an 8…
Despite the high development costs associated with IC-processing technology, using smaller nodes yields larger revenue per wafer, according to new research from IC Insights. The success and proliferation of integrated circuits has largely hinged on the ability of IC manufacturers to continue offering more performance and functionality for the money. Driving down the cost of…
Only five semiconductor companies hold 53 percent of total global wafer capacity, according to IC Insights. In 2019, each company had capacity of more than 1,000,000 wafer starts per month. In contrast, the top five capacity leaders in 2009 held 36 percent of worldwide capacity. Capacity at other semiconductor leaders, including Intel (817K wafers/month), UMC…
The global semiconductor market is expected to rebound this year by as much as 7.9 percent, but the ghosts of 2019 haven’t vanished. Tariffs still impact more than $350 billion worth of imported Chinese goods — including the chips and passives that are staples of electronic systems — and economic indicators are suppressing spending. “Brexit,…
IC Insights predicts a record amount of IC capacity will be added by semiconductor manufacturers in 2020- 2021. Notably, most of that increase will come from the Far East. U.S. manufacturers across all industries, in a recent manufacturing survey, decreased their capital expenditure budgets for 2020. Typically, the IC industry meets most of its IC…
NAND flash will be the fastest-growing semiconductor product in 2020, with DRAM in third place, according to market research firm IC Insights. The strong anticipated market growth for the two memory segments is not a big surprise given the complete market collapse that these two segments experienced in 2019, the firm said. The 2020 NAND…
With a forecasted 34 percent drop in the memory market this year, Intel is once again expected to rank as the largest semiconductor supplier and have sales that are 26 percent larger than Samsung in 2019, according to market research firm IC Insights. Intel was the number one ranked semiconductor supplier in 1Q17 but lost…
U.S. factory activity contracted for the third straight month in October as trade issues, the GM strike and global economic uncertainty plagued the market. The Institute for Supply Management’s manufacturing index registered 48.3 last month, up slightly from a 10-year low of 47.8 in September. New orders, employment and inventories all rose from September but…
After slowing in the past couple years, semiconductor merger and acquisition activity strengthened in the first eight months of 2019 with the combined value of about 20 M&A agreement announcements reaching $28.0 billion for the purchase of chip companies, business units, product lines, intellectual property (IP), and wafer fabs between January and the end of…